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Working with Businesses

Get an early view of emerging AI ideas, practice and talent.

Agent Build Club helps you connect with universities and student communities working with AI, creating opportunities to explore new approaches and build relationships with the people developing tomorrow's capabilities.

Line drawing of a business person kneeling by a row of seedlings, reading a tablet beside one plant that has grown tall
What we hear

Businesses demand more AI talent

AI is changing what organisations need from their people, and where they find them.

The skills you will need next are emerging faster than you can hire for them.

Identifying what skills will matter, where they are emerging, and who is developing them is becoming harder. Traditional talent pathways were not built for capabilities that are still taking shape.

Your teams can see the opportunities but have little room to test them.

Exploring what AI could do for a product, process or service takes time, people and a safe place to experiment. Few teams can resource that alongside day-to-day work without committing to a full build too early.

The people working on what comes next are hard to reach.

Universities are a key source of emerging knowledge, talent and experimentation, but the connection between academia and business is limited, and it is often unclear where to start.

Why ABC

A place where business, academia and learners can experiment together

Agent Build Club is a co-learning community that bridges academia and business, with applied AI educators, technology vendors and guest speakers bringing the teaching, the tools and the practice. We bring companies into the same room as students, researchers and practitioners, working on real problems rather than case studies. You get early sight of emerging practice and of the people developing it. They get a problem that matters and someone who knows the industry.

What we do

What we offer to businesses

Ready-made formats you can book, sized to the question you want answered.

Workshops

Bring a real problem your team has not cracked, and leave with approaches nobody in the room had considered.

Hackathons

Set a challenge, see several credible answers in days.

Innovation Talks

Hear what peers are building, and what they abandoned.

Business Challenge Workshops

Put your challenge in front of people who owe you no received wisdom, and watch what they ask about first.

Employability Clinics

Meet candidates who can show you, not just tell you.

ABC Community

Stay close to how practice is changing, without a training budget.

How we work

How we work with Businesses

Three ways to engage, shaped around your challenges, your teams and your AI maturity.

One-off sessions

A single hackathon, workshop or panel built around a question your organisation wants to explore.

Programme partnerships

A structured project with a university cohort, such as the AI Innovation Accelerator, with a defined brief and outcome.

Long-term partnerships

An ongoing relationship with university communities, from co-designed projects to early access to emerging talent.

This season

Host a Crackathon™ for your staff

An AI hackathon built around a real problem in your business, for a team celebration, an away day or a project wrap, from a two-hour session to a weekend sprint.

Find out more

Who we help

Find a way to engage that fits your organisation.

Different organisations arrive with different questions. Find the one that sounds like yours.

University Spinouts

Harness AI to supercharge your growth

Startups

Explore how emerging AI could support your product, operations, or growth.

SMEs

Identify practical opportunities to apply AI without building everything prematurely.

Enterprise

Explore emerging AI across complex processes, systems and organisational constraints.

Professional Services

Investigate how AI could change the way expertise is delivered and the capabilities your teams need.

Latest reading for business teams

What we have been writing that bears on your work.

Interested in investing in the people building the capabilities of tomorrow?

Speak to the team about working with students and researchers on the AI questions that matter to your organisation.