Enterprise AIFebruary 10, 2026 · 7 min read

OpenAI Frontier: The Enterprise AI Agent Platform That Wants to Replace Your Software Stack

On February 5, 2026, OpenAI launched Frontier—a platform where AI agents don't just assist with your work, they operate your enterprise software for you. With HP, Uber, and Intuit already on board, this is OpenAI's biggest bid yet to become the operating system of the enterprise.

1,500

hours/month saved (one customer)

6→1

weeks to days (manufacturing)

90%

more time freed for sales teams

1M+

business customers on OpenAI

What Happened

On February 5, 2026, OpenAI launched Frontier—an enterprise platform for building, deploying, and managing AI agents that can operate other software. Unlike traditional AI chatbots, Frontier agents work autonomously across systems like Salesforce, Workday, and internal data warehouses. Early adopters including HP, Uber, Intuit, Oracle, State Farm, and Thermo Fisher Scientific are already reporting dramatic productivity gains. OpenAI is positioning Frontier as nothing less than "an intelligence layer" for the entire enterprise.

What Is Frontier, Exactly?

Frontier is OpenAI's attempt to move beyond being an AI model provider and become the operating system for enterprise AI. According to Barret Zoph, OpenAI's GM of B2B: "What we're fundamentally doing is basically transitioning agents into true AI co-workers."

The platform connects to a company's existing software, data, and workflows—then lets employees create AI agents using natural language in a ChatGPT-like interface. Describe what you want the agent to do, connect it to the right tools, and let it work.

The Four Pillars of Frontier

Shared Business Context

Connects siloed applications, ticketing tools, and data warehouses to create what OpenAI calls "durable institutional memory." Agents understand how information flows, where decisions happen, and what outcomes matter.

Agent Execution

A dependable runtime where agents plan and act across files, tools, and code. Can run locally, in an enterprise cloud, or OpenAI-hosted. Multiple agents work simultaneously on complex tasks across different systems.

Evaluation & Optimization

Built-in dashboards track metrics like task success rates, output accuracy, and even agent "politeness." A full audit log of every completed task enables quality evaluations and continuous improvement.

Identity & Governance

Enterprise-grade IAM for AI agents. Each agent gets a defined identity, scoped permissions, and guardrails. Meets SOC 2 Type II, ISO/IEC 27001, and other compliance standards.

"Frontier works with the systems teams already have, without forcing them to replatform."

— OpenAI, February 5, 2026

Notably, Frontier is multi-vendor—it works with agents built on models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Microsoft. This open approach is a strategic play: OpenAI wants to be the orchestration layer even if you're running someone else's models.

Early Results: What Companies Are Seeing

Frontier is currently in limited availability, but early adopters are already reporting significant results. OpenAI plans to pair customers with "forward-deployed engineers" to help develop best practices.

Major Manufacturer

Production optimization: 6 weeks → 1 day

Global Investment Company

90%+ more time for salespeople with customers

Tech Company

1,500 hours/month saved in product development

Early Adopters

HPIntuitOracleState FarmThermo FisherUber

Pilot customers also include BBVA, Cisco, and T-Mobile.

Why This Matters: The Enterprise AI Land Grab

Frontier didn't launch in a vacuum. It dropped the same day as Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.6 and just days after Anthropic's Cowork plugins triggered a $285 billion stock selloff. The timing is no coincidence—AI companies are racing to own the enterprise workflow layer.

Enterprise customers account for roughly 40% of OpenAI's revenue. CFO Sarah Friar expects that to push toward 50% by end of 2026. With more than 1 million business customers already using OpenAI's technology, Frontier is the company's play to convert API usage into deeper, platform-level relationships.

The Competitive Landscape

Anthropic: Claude Cowork + domain-specific plugins (legal, finance, sales)
Microsoft: Agent 365, deeply integrated into the Office ecosystem
Salesforce: Agentforce, building autonomous agents inside CRM
Google: Gemini Enterprise, leveraging existing cloud relationships
Glean: Enterprise knowledge agents with deep data integrations

As Fidji Simo, OpenAI's CEO of Applications, put it: when she was CEO of Instacart, giving teams access to the best AI tools meant "assessing hundreds of different software vendors" and spending "months integrating each." Frontier aims to collapse that into a single platform.

What This Means for the Future of Work

Frontier represents a fundamental shift in how AI companies relate to enterprise software. OpenAI isn't just providing intelligence—it's providing the layer that orchestrates how that intelligence operates across an organization's entire tech stack.

The Threat to SaaS

Combined with Anthropic's Cowork plugins, Frontier raises an existential question for traditional software companies: if an AI agent can execute sales workflows without a human ever logging into Salesforce, what happens to per-seat licensing? If an agent can do financial modeling without opening a spreadsheet, what are you paying for?

Before Frontier

Companies buy 10+ SaaS tools. Each has its own AI features bolted on. Data stays siloed. Workers switch between apps all day.

The Frontier Vision

AI agents operate your software for you. One intelligence layer connects everything. Workers describe what they need; agents execute across systems.

The Skeptics Have a Point

Not everyone is convinced Frontier will live up to the hype. Industry analysts have raised valid concerns:

Implementation complexity: Building a company-wide "semantic layer" is a months-long project requiring significant technical investment
Enterprise readiness: Frontier is designed for large companies with dedicated technical teams and substantial budgets
Trust gap: Giving AI agents autonomous access to run enterprise software requires a level of trust many organizations haven't reached
Pricing unknown: OpenAI hasn't disclosed costs, and enterprise AI platforms aren't cheap

Reality Check: Frontier's early results are impressive, but they come from hand-picked enterprise partners with dedicated OpenAI engineering support. How the platform performs at scale, without white-glove onboarding, remains an open question.

What To Do Now

Whether you work at a Fortune 500 or a five-person startup, the rise of enterprise AI agent platforms has practical implications right now.

For Enterprise Teams

Audit your workflows: Identify multi-step, cross-system processes that agents could handle
Evaluate, don't commit: Request a Frontier pilot, but also evaluate Anthropic Cowork and Microsoft Agent 365
Think about governance early: AI agents operating software autonomously need clear permission boundaries
Prepare your data: Agents are only as good as the business context they can access

For Individual Knowledge Workers

Learn agentic workflows: Understanding how to direct and evaluate AI agents is becoming a core skill
Focus on judgment and strategy: Routine execution is being automated; high-level thinking isn't
Consider privacy: Enterprise platforms send your data through cloud AI. If your work involves sensitive information, understand where it goes.

Not Every AI Workflow Needs an Enterprise Platform

Frontier is built for large organizations with complex, multi-system workflows. But most knowledge workers need AI that works with them personally—across every app on their Mac, without sending sensitive data to the cloud. Elephas brings AI to your desktop with your data staying private and on-device.

Learn more about Elephas →

Frequently Asked Questions

What is OpenAI Frontier?

OpenAI Frontier is an enterprise platform launched on February 5, 2026 that lets companies build, deploy, and manage AI agents. These agents can operate existing software like Salesforce and Workday, automate multi-step workflows, and improve over time through built-in memory and feedback loops.

Which companies are using OpenAI Frontier?

Early adopters include HP, Intuit, Oracle, State Farm, Thermo Fisher Scientific, and Uber. Pilot customers include BBVA, Cisco, and T-Mobile. The platform is currently in limited availability with broader rollout planned for later in 2026.

How much does OpenAI Frontier cost?

OpenAI has not publicly disclosed pricing for Frontier. The platform is currently only available to a limited set of enterprise customers, with forward-deployed engineers helping companies develop best practices.

Does OpenAI Frontier only work with OpenAI models?

No. Frontier is designed as an open, multi-vendor platform. It supports AI agents built on models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Microsoft. OpenAI says the platform "works with the systems teams already have, without forcing them to replatform."

How is OpenAI Frontier different from Anthropic's Claude Cowork?

While both target enterprise AI workflows, Frontier focuses on being a centralized management and orchestration layer for AI agents across an organization. Claude Cowork emphasizes individual professional productivity with domain-specific plugins. Frontier is more of an "operating system" for AI agents; Cowork is more of a personal AI assistant for knowledge workers.

The Bottom Line

OpenAI Frontier is the clearest signal yet that AI companies are no longer content to sit beneath enterprise software—they want to sit above it. The vision of AI agents that don't just chat but actually operate your company's tools is ambitious and, if the early results hold, potentially transformative.

But ambition and execution are different things. Frontier is limited availability, pricing is undisclosed, and the early wins come with significant engineering support. The question isn't whether AI agents will operate enterprise software—it's whether OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft, or someone else will own that layer.

What to watch next: Frontier's broader rollout timeline, pricing details, and whether Salesforce, Microsoft, and other incumbents accelerate their own agent platforms in response. The enterprise AI platform war is officially underway.

Related Coverage

Anthropic's Legal AI Plugin Triggers $285B Stock Selloff

The Cowork plugin launch that started the SaaSpocalypse

Claude Opus 4.6 vs GPT-5.3 Codex: Head-to-Head

The models behind the platforms — benchmark breakdowns and what they mean

Elephas for Productivity: AI That Works on Your Mac

Personal AI productivity without the enterprise complexity