| On Coventa’s payroll | Hire-and-manage | Build-operate-transfer | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What Coventa provides | Its own AI FDEs, designers and specialists, embedded with you | Recruitment to your specification, then day-to-day delivery management | The team, the platform and the process — built, run, then transferred |
| Who directs the work day to day | Coventa, through VisionX, with your stakeholders in the loop | Coventa manages; the team sits inside your organisation | Coventa during the operate phase; you after transfer |
| Where the capability ends up | With Coventa, as your extended team for as long as you want it | Inside your organisation from the start | Inside your organisation at transfer |
| Time to start | Fastest — no recruitment cycle | Recruitment lead time applies | Build phase first; often begins with a focused scope |
| On-premises delivery | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Typical sponsor | COO, CIO — a process that needs to be in production | CHRO, CIO — a team the organisation wants to own but cannot yet hire | CEO, CIO, CDO — a captive AI centre of excellence |
| Best when | Speed matters and headcount approval does not exist | You want in-house talent and lack AI hiring and management capability | You want sovereignty over the capability — common in government and regulated sectors |
1. AI forward deployed engineers on Coventa’s payroll
This is the fastest way to get an AI idea into production. Coventa’s engineers arrive with VisionX and begin the Landscape and Audit phases immediately; clients typically see a working first version within the first week. Because the engineers are Coventa’s, the contract can carry the commitments a traditional systems integrator cannot: beyond-SLA terms on business outcomes, gain-share on verified savings, a ring-fenced innovation fund, and pooled Flex Pool capacity for enhancements without new statements of work.
Choose it when the organisation has a process that needs to be in production and no path to hiring for it, or when it wants to prove the outcome before deciding how much capability to own.
2. Hire-and-manage
Non-IT-native organisations rarely fail at AI for lack of budget. They fail because they cannot assess, attract or manage AI engineers, and a good hire left unmanaged becomes another stalled pilot. Hire-and-manage separates the two problems: Coventa finds and vets the people, and then runs their delivery the same way it runs its own — VisionX pillars, bounded autonomy, continuous evaluation, an audit trail — while the team sits inside the client’s organisation from day one.
Choose it when the organisation wants the capability in-house and permanent, and wants a partner accountable for making the new team productive. Coventa also works alongside existing internal teams, accelerating a project they lack capacity for or bringing AI expertise to areas where they want to build it.
3. Build-operate-transfer
BOT is how an organisation ends up with its own AI centre of excellence without standing one up from nothing. During the build phase Coventa scopes and ships the first systems on VisionX. During the operate phase Coventa runs them — monitoring, reliability, continuous improvement, the single visibility dashboard across every service — and the client’s people work alongside. At transfer, what changes is accountability, not the system: the process packs, documentation and audit trail that made the work repeatable are what make it transferable.
Choose it when sovereignty over the capability matters — government bodies, regulated industries, organisations with data that cannot leave their control — or when the goal from the outset is a captive team.
What is the same in every model
- VisionX. Every engagement runs on Coventa’s AI FDE platform, through the six pillars: Landscape, Audit, Blueprint, Architecture, Migrate, Build.
- On-premises or remote. Delivery follows the client’s data, not the other way round.
- Governance. Bounded autonomy, guardian agents, continuous evaluations and an immutable audit trail, aligned to ISO 20000/27001, ITIL 4 and SOC 2 controls. Approval and rollback stay with the client’s team.
- Support after launch. Coventa does not build and disappear. Managed services — support, enhancement, monitoring, roadmap planning — are available under any model.
- Outcome, not headcount. The commercial model rejects per-FTE pricing for scaled work in favour of outcomes that are measured against a frozen baseline and verified before they count.
How to choose
- Is the priority a result in production this quarter? Start on Coventa’s payroll.
- Is the priority a team you employ, and the blocker is hiring and managing AI talent? Hire-and-manage.
- Is the priority owning the whole capability — team, platform, process — and you can accept a build and operate phase first? Build-operate-transfer.
- Not sure? Most engagements begin the same way regardless: a conversation, then a focused 30-day scope on one process. The model can change as the organisation learns what it wants to own.
Frequently asked questions
What engagement models does Coventa offer?
Three. Resources on Coventa's payroll, where Coventa employs the AI forward deployed engineers and embeds them with you on site or remotely. Hire-and-manage, where Coventa recruits talent to your specification and then manages their delivery inside your organisation. And build-operate-transfer (BOT), where Coventa builds the team and the system, operates them to agreed outcomes, and then transfers both to you.
What is a build-operate-transfer (BOT) model for an AI team?
A build-operate-transfer engagement is one in which a partner builds a capability — the team, the platform, the processes — operates it for a period against agreed outcomes, and then hands the whole thing over to the client to run in-house. For AI it is the route to a captive AI team or AI centre of excellence without having to hire, tool and govern it from a standing start. Coventa scopes BOT engagements with the transfer in view from day one.
Which engagement model suits a government or data-sensitive organisation?
Usually build-operate-transfer or hire-and-manage, delivered on the organisation's own premises. Both keep the capability, and eventually the people, inside the organisation, which is what sovereignty and data-residency requirements tend to demand. Coventa delivers on-premises or remote, and VisionX's governance — bounded autonomy, an immutable audit trail, human approval gates — applies in every model.
Which model is fastest to start?
Resources on Coventa's payroll. There is no recruitment cycle and no headcount approval on the client side: Coventa's engineers arrive with VisionX and start on the Landscape and Audit phases immediately. Many clients begin with a focused 30-day engagement to solve one specific problem, then decide on the longer-term shape.
How does the transfer work in a BOT engagement?
The transfer is planned from the start rather than negotiated at the end. Because every VisionX service is delivered as a standardised, repeatable process pack with documentation and an audit trail, what is handed over is a running system, the people who run it, and the process that keeps it running. The operating period, transfer conditions and commercial terms are agreed per engagement.
How is Coventa's on-payroll model different from staff augmentation?
Staff augmentation sells hours against a specification the client already owns. Coventa's engineers arrive with a method (VisionX), governed agent tooling and accountability for the outcome, and the contract can carry beyond-SLA commitments, gain-share on verified savings and pooled Flex Pool capacity instead of new statements of work. The unit of value is the system in production, not the day rate.
How much does each model cost?
Coventa does not publish fixed rates, because a 30-day focused build and a multi-year build-operate-transfer are priced differently. Coventa's position is that its AI-accelerated approach delivers more value per dollar than traditional agencies or large consultancies because lean pods with governed agents replace large time-and-materials teams. A direct conversation about scope is the fastest way to a number.