AI Universe executive brief
The governed layer that keeps AI initiatives safe.
AI Universe allows your organization to build with speed and go from AI pilots to production in a way that is controllable and can be replicated again and again.
From pilot to production
The first wave of enterprise AI was about access: licences, productivity tools and copilots bolted onto existing workflows. That wave has largely landed, and the organizations pulling ahead are the ones building on top of AI, not just consuming it.
The gap between “we use AI” and “we ship AI-powered products” is almost always an infrastructure and governance gap, not a talent or ambition gap.
Building custom AI applications is different from buying seats in a SaaS solution, and requires a secure, observable, cost-controlled Azure foundation that most teams do not have in place.
Moving from AI access to AI building, your organisation faces three difficult paths.
Moving from AI access to AI building, your organisation faces three difficult paths:
Build it in-house
Teams assemble Azure infrastructure from scratch. This works, but takes six to twelve months before any application ships safely. The governance layer is often the first thing cut under delivery pressure.
Point tools
Off-the-shelf AI platforms deliver fast starts but lock data and models into a vendor environment outside your Azure tenant, creating compliance and data sovereignty risks.
Proceed without
Unmanaged AI building creates shadow infrastructure, inconsistent security posture and ungoverned cost exposure that compound over time.
A governed Azure foundation
You build the use-case-specific features. AI Universe provides the governed Azure foundation around them. You own the data, you build in your own tenant, you control the whole environment and foundation for building with AI.
Built in your Azure tenant
All infrastructure is provisioned inside your own subscription. No shared environments, no vendor lock-in. Your data and models stay under your governance policies.
Governed AI gateway
A single, observable entry point for all AI traffic. Rate limiting, cost allocation, policy enforcement and usage logging are centralised from day one.
Working foundation from the start
Infrastructure, pipelines and application templates are delivered as a running platform, not a set of architectural diagrams.
Scales across use cases
One foundation supports multiple AI applications. New teams and use cases onboard to an environment that is already governed, instrumented and production-ready.
Governed AI building
A repeatable delivery model
Every new use case starts from a shared governed foundation, not a blank project. Delivery gets faster as the organisation builds more.
Full data and IP ownership
Data, models, secrets and infrastructure stay inside your own Azure tenant. No data leaves the organisation’s environment.
Risk and governance
Governance, identity, audit and access control are part of the platform from day one, not retrofitted after the first incident.
Knowledge compounds
Patterns, context and guardrails improve across projects. Each new use case benefits from what the organisation has already built.
Faster time to value
Teams build from a working foundation rather than assembling platform components from scratch. Months of foundation work are already done.
Ongoing platform maintenance
Fortytwo maintains the shared platform layer, delivering security improvements and updates without disrupting running applications.
Shared design system
Reusable UI component library and application templates. Teams start with consistent, reviewed components and focus on the features that differentiate the use case.
Three-tier wisdom system
Curated AI guidance at three levels: Fortytwo baseline, organisation and application. AI tools produce architecture-aligned, reviewed output from the first line of code.
We wired it all up
Fortytwo has opinionated the entire setup and wired it together: identity, model access, governance, delivery and code quality, built on the vast ecosystem of AI features in Azure. You start from our decisions, not a blank subscription. And you run it yourself: one control plane gives you self-service over policy, governance, galaxies and wisdom, instead of switching between a dozen Azure portals.
Concentrated depth in identity, security, AI and Azure platform engineering. We go deep on Microsoft so our clients get expertise, not generalism.
AI Universe is built on the Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework and aligns to the Azure AI reference architecture. The foundation is sound before the first line of product code is written.
Proximity, language and a track record on production Azure environments that meet European compliance requirements.
Platform maintenance, architectural guidance and hands-on support are part of the engagement model. A platform you ship into and then abandon is not a foundation.
We hand you a governed foundation you own.
Built for your teams
No more scattered tools
Consolidate AI development into one owned, controlled environment. Teams contribute their domain knowledge without bypassing IT controls or creating a new shadow AI estate. Day-to-day management is self-service in one control plane, not spread across Azure portals.
Data stays in your tenant.
AI traffic routed through a governed gateway. Logging through Application Insights and Log Analytics. Per-application identity. Policy controls in place from deployment. Designed to support SOC 2 and EU AI Act readiness.
Start from a working foundation.
Repository, server, client, Bicep IaC and CI/CD in place from day one. One governed gateway for model access. Enforced code quality applies to AI-generated code. Modular architecture that stays maintainable.
No rebuild for each use case.
Repeatable delivery without rebuilding identity, model access, logging, and deployment for every new application. Isolated environments with shared governance. Platform updates delivered as container images.
Get an AI Universe demo
Let us show you how it works. Book a demo call, a 45-minute demonstration where we show you how it works.
FAQ
How does Fortytwo AI Universe support EU AI Act readiness?
AI Universe is designed so that no application data, model call payloads or user data leaves your Microsoft Azure tenant. The platform deploys inside your own Azure subscription using your own compute, storage and networking resources.
Fortytwo does not operate a shared cloud environment that your data passes through. For organisations with EU data residency requirements, AI Universe can be deployed in Azure regions within the European Economic Area.
The data processing footprint stays within your tenant and is subject to your existing GDPR controls, retention policies and data subject access procedures. Because you own the Azure resources and the application codebase, the platform runtime does not require a separate vendor data processing agreement beyond your existing Microsoft Azure agreement.
What audit evidence does AI Universe produce for governance and compliance programmes?
AI Universe is designed to support EU AI Act readiness through its deployment model and built-in technical controls. Because the platform deploys inside your own Microsoft Azure tenant, you retain full control over data processing, model access and application behaviour within your existing governance and compliance perimeter.
The controls relevant to EU AI Act compliance programmes include: a governed AI gateway that applies model access policies and usage logging centrally across all applications; Azure Content Safety filters at the model access layer; Azure AI Foundry Prompt Shields for prompt injection defence; structured AI call logs stored in Azure Log Analytics within your tenant; and per-application identity isolation via Microsoft Entra ID that attributes each AI interaction to a specific application and team.
AI Universe provides the technical infrastructure and audit evidence your compliance programme can rely on. Responsibility for risk classification, human oversight requirements and documentation obligations under the Act rests with you.
How does AI Universe address data sovereignty and GDPR requirements for enterprise organisations?
AI Universe produces audit evidence through Azure Log Analytics and Application Insights, both hosted within your own Azure tenant.
The evidence is available from day one and includes:
– AI call logs with timestamps
– Model identifiers and token counts
– Policy enforcement events from the AI gateway
– Azure Content Safety decisions on prompts and responses
– Application health metrics
– Infrastructure change history from the CI/CD pipeline
All logs are stored in your Azure environment using standard Azure logging services. They are queryable, exportable, and subject to whatever retention policies you apply to your workspace. This evidence supports internal AI governance reporting, external audit requests, board-level risk reviews and responses to regulatory inquiries.
How does AI Universe align with AI governance frameworks such as ISO 42001 and the NIST AI Risk Management? Framework?
AI Universe is built around the governance controls that ISO 42001 and the NIST AI Risk Management Framework identify as foundational: transparency, accountability, access control, risk monitoring, and human oversight mechanisms.
In practice: each application environment has a defined identity, scoped access, and a documented model access policy:
– AI usage is logged and attributable per application and team.
– Content safety controls are applied at the gateway layer.
– Infrastructure is defined in code, making the environment auditable and reproducible.
– Security gates run on every build, including AI-generated code.
These controls support the documentation and evidence requirements that ISO 42001 and NIST AI RMF programmes typically call for. AI Universe does not provide certification. It provides the technical infrastructure and audit evidence that your governance programme can build on.
What does AI Universe cost?
AI Universe is a framework subscription at a flat monthly fee. Azure resources run in your own tenant and are billed by Microsoft at cost, and purchases through Azure Marketplace can draw down your Microsoft Azure Consumption Commitment (MACC). Contact us for current pricing and a deployment plan.
How do we manage AI Universe day to day?
Through one self-service control plane. Policy, governance, galaxies, wisdom and model access are all managed in one place, so day-to-day operation does not require switching between Azure portals. Everything still runs as standard Azure resources in your own subscription, so the Azure portal is never closed to you, it is just not needed for daily work.
Let’s talk about AI
If you want more information about AI Universe, or want a live demo, don’t hesitate to contact us.
