Forward Deployed Engineers
An Actual engineer on your team until your software factory runs without us.
We embed with your engineers for a fixed term, get your software factory running, and leave when your team operates it alone. Rates are below market and quoted on a scoping call.
Engagement
Fixed term
Length agreed on the scoping call
Rate
Below market
Quoted on the scoping call
- An Actual employee embedded in your team, not a subcontractor
- A software factory running in your repos, CI, and cloud
- Remote by default, on site by agreement
- Ends when your team runs it without us
Problem
The tools are ready. The install is the hard part.
A software factory is not a download. Someone has to wire agents, specs, and quality gates into the way your team already ships. That is real engineering work, and it usually lands on people who already have a roadmap.
Your best engineers are already booked
The people who could lead the rollout are the ones you can least afford to pull off product work.
Consultancies learn on your time
A general consultancy bills you while it works out how the pieces fit. You pay for the learning before you pay for the install.
Agents on laptops are not a factory
A coding agent in each engineer's editor does not add up to a pipeline. Work still moves one person at a time.
Nobody owns the rollout
Spread across a team as a side project, the factory stalls at a proof of concept.
Offer
An engineer from Actual, working inside your team
One of our engineers joins your team for a fixed term. They get a software factory running in your environment, ship real work through it alongside your engineers, and leave when your team runs it alone.
Embedded in your team
Your standups, your channels, your review process. The engineer works remotely by default and comes on site by agreement.
Software factory installed
Agents, specs, and quality gates wired into your repositories and CI, so work moves through one pipeline instead of individual laptops.
Built in your systems
Everything is set up in your repositories, CI, and cloud accounts, under your access controls.
Real work shipped through it
The factory is proven on your own backlog. Pull requests go through your repo and your CI, reviewed by your engineers.
Your engineers trained by doing
Your team pairs with ours on the build, so the knowledge stays with you when the term ends.
A defined exit
Handover criteria are agreed before kickoff. The engagement ends when your team operates the factory without us.
Process
From scoping call to handover
Four phases, with the term and the exit agreed before the first one starts.
Before kickoff
Scoping call
We agree what the factory should do, what done looks like, and how long it should take. You get the term and the rate in writing.
Start of term
Embed
Our engineer joins your team's channels and rituals and gets access to your repositories, CI, and cloud under your controls.
During the term
Install and ship
The software factory goes in, and real work from your backlog goes through it, with your engineers pairing throughout.
End of term
Hand over
We check the handover criteria agreed at the start. Your team runs the factory without us, and the engagement ends.
Engagement
Fixed term. Defined exit. Quoted up front.
Engagement
Fixed term
Set in writing before kickoff
Rate
Below market
One figure, quoted after scoping
Every engagement has a term and a rate fixed in writing before kickoff, with the handover criteria agreed at the same time.
Engagement commitments
- Term fixed in writing before kickoff
- Rate quoted in writing after the scoping call
- Handover criteria agreed before kickoff
- Work happens in your repos, CI, and cloud
- An Actual employee, not a subcontractor
- Agent governance is a separate product, not part of the engagement
Next step
Then govern what your factory builds
Once your factory is running, we believe you will want to take the next step: an agent governance platform that gets the most from it. That is the product we sell, the Architecture Agent. It gives your agents architecture decision records and managed context files to work from, and reviews the code they write against your architecture. It is not part of this engagement, and it is why the engagement is priced below market.
See the Architecture AgentFrequently asked questions
Put an Actual engineer on your team
Tell us about the factory you want running and by when. We will come back with a term and a rate.