Co-Build / Joint GTM Partnership

A specific opportunity and real leverage on both sides. The partner brings client demand, a market wedge, a data asset, distribution, or ecosystem advantage; Proof Engine brings validation, product and AI build capacity, and GTM execution. An interest in working together is not enough.

With paid discovery and commercial and legal alignment before deeper work. Discovery produces a partnership thesis, a contribution map of what each side brings, a validation plan, a GTM plan, commercial model options, a risk and dependency map, and a Phase 1 execution plan.

In discovery, against the risk, effort, upside, and control on each side. The default assumption is paid work, cash-first. Equity, revenue share, or success-based upside requires legal and commercial review, and only makes sense when the partner contribution is genuinely material.

They are made explicit in discovery rather than assumed. For standard paid work, IP transfers to the client; a co-build is the case where ownership genuinely has to be negotiated, so decision rights and ownership questions are a named deliverable alongside a legal and commercial review checklist.

When the opportunity is still vague, when the partner mainly wants unpaid work for vague future upside, when decision rights or commercial incentives are unclear, or when the request depends on Proof Engine acting like a fund, broker, or guaranteed sales channel. See partner principles.