How a white-label engagement works
Five steps, what we need from you at each, and what your client sees.
Outsourcing AI development as an agency works like this: we sign a mutual NDA and non-solicit first, take a 45-minute scoping call, and come back within three working days with a fixed price, a fixed date and an explicit out-of-scope list. You mark it up and quote your client.
The build happens in your repositories under an identity you control, with a weekly written update in your voice that you can forward unedited. Handover is documentation, runbooks and a recorded walkthrough authored as your agency. Your client never learns we exist.
The five steps
- 01day 0
NDA and non-solicit
Signed before we see a brief. We will sign yours rather than push ours - whichever moves faster through your legal process. It covers your client and your staff, in both directions.
- 0245-60 min, within 2 working days
Scoping call
You bring what your client asked for, in their words. We come back with what is buildable, what the hard part will be, and what we would not attempt. If we think the project is a bad idea, you hear it here rather than after you have quoted.
- 03within 3 working days
Fixed quote
One price, one date, a written scope and an explicit out-of-scope list. The out-of-scope list is the useful half - it is what stops a scope argument in week five.
- 043-16 weeks
Build
In your repos, against your standards, with a weekly demo and a written update you can forward. A staging environment your client can click through, on their infrastructure or ours.
- 05final week
Handover
Documentation, runbooks, the evaluation harness and a recorded walkthrough, all in your agency's voice.
What we need from you, and when
| Stage | What we need | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Before scoping | Signed NDA and non-solicit | So you can speak freely about your client on the call |
| Scoping | The brief in your client's own words, plus ten representative files if documents are involved | Real files change an estimate more than any other input |
| Quoting | Your deadline and your client's budget range | We will tell you honestly if they do not meet |
| Kickoff | Repository access, an email alias on your domain, a Slack or Teams guest seat | So commits, documents and calls all carry your identity |
| Kickoff | Your client's cloud and model provider accounts, or permission to host during development | Keeps API spend at cost and avoids a migration at handover |
| Weekly | Thirty minutes, or nothing at all if you prefer written only | Most delays we see come from a question waiting for an answer |
| Handover | Who on your side owns it afterwards | The walkthrough is recorded for that person specifically |
What your client sees
- 01Your agency's name on the proposal, the contract, the invoices and every deliverable.
- 02Commits authored by an identity you control, in a repository you own.
- 03A weekly written update in your voice, with no reference to a partner.
- 04A staging environment on their own domain or yours.
- 05Calls with your team - and with us under your brand, if you want us there.
- 06Documentation and runbooks authored as your agency.
What they never see: our name, our email domain, our staff on a directory, a sub-processor list naming us, or any contact from us during the project or after it. The full commitment is on the white-label page.
Where engagements go wrong, and what we do about it
- 01The client's data is worse than anyone said.We ask for ten real files at scoping precisely to find this early. When it still happens, we quote the extra before doing it, rather than absorbing it silently and rushing the end.
- 02The brief was a solution, not a problem.A client asking for "an AI chatbot" usually wants something more specific. We will ask what the chatbot is supposed to make faster, and sometimes that changes the build.
- 03Access takes three weeks.The single most common cause of a late project. We list every credential we need at kickoff and chase it, but you will get faster answers from your client than we can.
- 04Nobody owns it afterwards.We ask at handover who that is, and record the walkthrough for them by name.
What this costs and what you keep
Fixed price per project, typically $4,500 to $26,000, against resale prices that leave most agencies a 50-60% margin. The full margin table by project type, and a worked example with the arithmetic, are on the white-label page. Published rates for everything else are on pricing.
Frequently asked questions
A signed NDA, whatever your client has already told you about the problem, and a 45-minute call with someone who understands what they actually want. That is enough for a fixed quote. Repository and cloud access are needed at kickoff, not at quoting.
A written weekly update in your agency's voice, with no reference to us, that you can forward to your client unedited. Plus a staging environment they can click through. Most agencies forward ours verbatim; some rewrite the top line and send the rest.
We quote the change in writing before starting it, so you can decide whether to absorb it or bill it on. Nothing appears on an invoice you did not approve, and we do not use scope changes as a way to recover a bad estimate.
Your client's, wherever possible - their cloud account, their model provider accounts, their domain. That keeps the API spend at cost rather than resold, and it means nothing has to be migrated at handover. We can host during development if their account is not ready.
Source, prompts, evaluation harness, infrastructure definitions, runbooks and a recorded walkthrough - all authored as your agency, with no mention of us anywhere in the documentation.
Yes. Either a retained number of hours a month, or a dedicated engineer at $2,800 a month who your client understands to be part of your team.
Send the brief, get a fixed number
NDA first, scoping call within two working days, fixed quote within three. Nothing about the process requires you to commit before you have the price.