The world sees Palantir as a platform. History shows they were a consulting firm that generalized later. The next wave of AI giants won't replace teams with magic SaaS—they will win through hand-to-hand combat and deep integration.
AI companies pitch "CS Agents" as a simple SaaS subscription. But real enterprises are messy webs of legacy systems, permissions, and human workflows.
"Just sign up, connect your email, and our AI replaces your CS team."
"Connecting to ZenDesk APIs, Jira tickets, Warehouse SQL, and Compliance logs."
Why companies like Distyl.ai (founded by Palantir veterans) link are betting on the "Consulting First" model.
Don't start with a generic platform. Start by solving one customer's excruciating problem using "Forward Deployed Engineers." It looks like consulting, but it's discovery.
As you build custom solutions, identify the repeated patterns. The connectors to legacy SQL, the RBAC wrappers, the approval queues. These become your libraries.
Only after solving the hard integration problems manually do you abstract it into a SaaS platform. Palantir didn't start as a platform; it emerged as one.
"Pick any two of the three: industry, role, or company size."