News
Research Report
The AI Transformation 100: Concrete Ideas for Fixing How We Work
Key Takeaways
- OpenAI launched a majority-owned deployment company with more than $4 billion in initial investment.
- The new unit will embed Forward Deployed Engineers inside enterprises to build production AI systems.
- OpenAI’s planned Tomoro acquisition adds roughly 150 AI deployment and consulting specialists.
- The move targets a major enterprise AI gap: companies are spending heavily but struggling to prove ROI.
OpenAI has launched the OpenAI Deployment Company (DeployCo), a majority-owned unit built to help organizations run AI systems across daily operations. The unit launched with more than $4 billion in initial investment from 19 global firms, according to OpenAI.
Alongside the launch, OpenAI agreed to acquire Tomoro, an applied AI consulting and engineering firm. The deal brings roughly 150 Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs) and deployment specialists to the new unit, pending regulatory approval in the coming months.
The investment consortium is led by TPG, with Advent, Bain Capital and Brookfield as co-lead founding partners. Additional partners include B Capital, BBVA, Emergence Capital, Goanna, Goldman Sachs, SoftBank Corp., Warburg Pincus and WCAS. Consulting firms Bain & Company, Capgemini and McKinsey & Company also invested.
Table of Contents
- What DeployCo Will Do
- The AI ROI Gap OpenAI Wants to Close
- OpenAI’s Acquisition Spree Points Toward the Enterprise
What DeployCo Will Do
"AI is becoming capable of doing increasingly meaningful work inside organizations. The challenge now is helping companies integrate these systems into the infrastructure and workflows that power their businesses."
- Denise Dresser
Chief Revenue Officer, OpenAI
The OpenAI Deployment Company is designed to help enterprises move AI from isolated pilots into the systems and workflows that shape daily operations. Rather than selling access to models alone, the new unit will embed Forward Deployed Engineers inside customer organizations to identify high-value use cases, redesign workflows and build production systems around OpenAI’s technology.
A typical engagement will start with a focused diagnostic to determine where AI can create the most operational value. From there, OpenAI Deployment Company engineers will work with leadership teams, technology teams, operators and frontline workers to select a small number of priority workflows. The goal is to build AI systems that connect to a company’s data, tools, controls and business processes so that employees can use them reliably in day-to-day work.
The Tomoro acquisition gives the new unit more deployment muscle from the start. If approved, the deal will bring roughly 150 Forward Deployed Engineers and deployment specialists with experience building AI systems for complex enterprise environments, including companies such as Tesco, Virgin Atlantic and Supercell.
OpenAI is also leaning on a broad partner network to scale the model. The OpenAI Deployment Company launches with more than $4 billion in initial investment and backing from 19 global investment firms, consultancies and systems integrators. Those partners sponsor or work with thousands of businesses, giving the new company a wider channel for AI adoption, change management and repeatable deployment patterns.
The AI ROI Gap OpenAI Wants to Close
OpenAI's State of Enterprise AI report, based on more than 1,000 leaders across six markets, described AI as a foundational operating layer rather than a discrete tool. Enterprises are adopting standardized platforms, shared governance and production-grade architectures.
AI budgets are climbing more than 10% as AI pilots move into production. Yet despite close to $40 billion in generative AI spending over two years, only 5% of enterprises have demonstrated real business returns, according to MIT research.
Architecture & Governance Gaps
Deployment architecture is converging toward unified platforms embedding governance and semantic capabilities natively. Yet:
- Only 22% of companies qualify as “future ready” in data infrastructure
- 51% remain hampered by disconnected systems.
In response, 90% of IT decision-makers are rethinking cloud strategies to balance cost, control and AI workload performance.
As PwC noted in its 2026 AI Business Predictions, cited in a recent VKTR analysis: "Real results take precision in picking a few spots where AI can deliver wholesale transformation, then executing with steady discipline."
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OpenAI’s Acquisition Spree Points Toward the Enterprise
Over the past two years, OpenAI has pursued aggressive expansion anchored by four acquisitions:
- Collaboration startup Multi for an undisclosed amount (June 2024)
- Statsig for $1.1 billion (September 2025)
- Neptune for under $400 million (December 2025)
- Promptfoo, which was valued at $86 million (March 2026)
On infrastructure, OpenAI secured a $38 billion AWS cloud contract, a restructured $250 billion Azure commitment, up to $100 billion in Nvidia investment and participation in the $500 billion Stargate data center venture with SoftBank and Oracle. In April 2026, OpenAI closed what it described as the largest private funding round in history at $122 billion.
The company’s leadership reportedly refocused its early 2026 strategy around coding and enterprise users, a move that included discontinuing its Sora video app.