• Implementation as the bottleneck: The majority of corporate AI projects fail not because of the technology, but due to a lack of support in integrating it into existing IT landscapes and processes.

• Demand creates new roles: Following its successful Series A funding round of EUR 17.5 million at the start of the year, the AI company Blockbrain is deliberately focusing on expanding its teams of Forward Deployed Engineers.

• Enablement instead of dependency: Thanks to the early involvement of FDEs, industrial clients such as Eberspächer already work fully and independently with Blockbrain’s AI platform today.

Stuttgart, May 28, 2026. 95 percent of generative AI pilot projects deliver no measurable business impact; only 5 percent scale successfully. This is the conclusion reached by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in a 2025 study. The cause rarely lies in the technology itself, but rather in the way it is embedded into existing IT landscapes, data structures, and workflows. Without clean integration, even the most powerful platform solution generates only additional costs instead of added value. Blockbrain, the AI company specializing in knowledge management, addresses this problem with a tailor-made expert role: the Forward Deployed Engineer, who effectively closes the gap between the AI solution and a company’s reality.

Bridge-builders between AI solution and reality

The title says it all: "Forward Deployed“ means that FDEs become active at the client even before official onboarding begins – at the front line, so to speak, before the AI solution is implemented into the existing system. Unlike traditional software developers, who develop standardized solutions in the background, FDEs work directly on site with the client. They analyze existing IT structures, identify integration hurdles, and connect the Blockbrain platform individually to each company’s data and system landscape. The added value lies not only in the technical integration, but in bringing together the platform, the IT architecture, and the employees who will later work with it every day, at an early stage: "The decisive difference is that we don’t arrive with a finished solution,“ says Bernhard Merkle, Head of Forward Deployed Engineers at Blockbrain.

"We first understand how the client works and how their processes run, and we plan the integration from there. That is why, in the end, the platform becomes part of the existing IT landscape and not just an external solution.“ The goal of every FDE engagement is to enable the clients: after a pilot phase of several months, the platform should be fully usable on their own.

Versatility as a success factor

The bottleneck does not lie in the technology. It lies in its embedding into real corporate environments – in legacy systems, heterogeneous data sources, and established processes: "No two clients are alike. Neither in their IT structure nor in their requirements,“ says Christoph Nißle, Head of Engineering at Blockbrain. "Every implementation therefore has to be individually tailored. To achieve this, we need to dive deep on a technical level, communicate complex matters in an understandable way to everyone involved, and find a dedicated solution for each environment. In a sense, we are the Swiss Army knives of AI adoption.“ There is no fixed career path for the position of Forward Deployed Engineer. What matters is a high level of technical understanding, an affinity for a wide range of topics, and the ability to effectively turn complex problem structures into solutions.

The underestimated side of AI adoption: people

What sets Blockbrain’s FDEs apart – and provides clients with lasting support in dealing with AI solutions – is not technical know-how alone. It is the human component: FDEs communicate with IT administrators just as much as with department heads and managing directors, moderate workshops, accompany change processes, and develop a deep understanding of what a company needs beyond the technical specification. This approach has already proven itself at industry leaders such as Bosch, Roland Berger, Eberspächer, and SGP Schneider Geiwitz:

"Blockbrain’s Forward Deployed Engineers did not simply deliver an AI platform. They understood how we work and tailored the solution to our requirements from the very beginning. Thanks to the close collaboration during the integration phase, AI is today a decisive lever for competitive advantage for us.“
– Tabea Hillmann, Head of AI Center of Excellence | SGP Schneider Geiwitz

Whether a large industrial corporation, a highly regulated industry, or a mid-sized company: the key to successful AI use with measurable business impact does not lie in the technology alone. It lies in the expert connection between existing systems and the people who are meant to use them every day. FDEs close the existing implementation gap and ensure that the acquisition of an AI solution generates real added value.

About Blockbrain

Blockbrain is an AI platform specializing in knowledge management that enables companies and organizations to securely digitize and scale expertise, processes, and decision logic using digital knowledge twins. The solution is used above all in knowledgeintensive as well as highly regulated and security-critical environments. In doing so, it meets the highest requirements for data protection (GDPR), IT security (ISO 27001), and the EU AI Act. Founded in 2022, the Stuttgart-based tech scale-up is led by Antonius Gress, Mattias Protzmann, and Nam Hai Ngo. Its clients include Bosch, Kärcher, SGP, Roland Berger, Bardehle Pagenberg, and the Seifert Logistics Group, among others. Funding to date totals EUR 22.5 million. For more information, visit: blockbrain.ai