• Home
  • Closing the ai deployment gap

Closing the AI Deployment Gap

An industry initiative to help make AI deployable, trusted, and sustainable in real-world mission-critical systems.

Artificial intelligence is moving from the lab into mission-critical environments. Deploying AI into systems that must be deterministic, secure, governable, and sustainable requires more than better models, it requires better systems engineering. The AI Deployment Gap Initiative brings together technology leaders who believe closing that gap requires collaboration across the ecosystem.

Read the Manifesto
Hero-2 Hero mobile-1
The challenge

The Challenge

AI that works in the lab is failing in the field.

 

Across aerospace, defense, robotics, industrial automation, transportation, and critical infrastructure, organizations are discovering that AI which performs well in development often struggles to meet the operational requirements of real-world systems.

 

The initiative identifies four engineering challenges that must be addressed before AI can become truly operational.

Four Gaps Must Be Closed

Execution

 AI must execute deterministically and predictably.

Integration

 AI must coexist with heterogeneous and mission-critical systems.

Governance

 AI decisions must be observable, traceable, and accountable.

Lifecycle

 AI must be maintainable, certifiable, and sustainable throughout long operation lifecycles. 

Who's Already In?

Members of the initiative collaborate to produce best practices, technical guidance, deployment readiness frameworks, reference architectures, joint whitepapers, deployment blueprints, operational case studies, webinars, and technical discussions.

CSW-Logo-White (FRAMED)
EDERA (FRAMED)-2
Lynx logo-1
Metavonics Logo (Framed)-1
Omnitrust (Framed)-3
PACE Framed-1
RunSafe Framed-1
Tasking Framed

Hear From Members

"In safety-critical and mission-critical environments, trust must be engineered, not assumed. Dependable AI is not optional. Every decision must be predictable, verifiable, and accountable, and every part of the ecosystem must be held to that same standard. That is why Critical Software is joining Lynx's AI Deployment Gap manifesto as a founding signatory, because closing that gap takes more than one company."

-  João Galego, Head of AI at Critical Software

Call to Action

"No single company closes the AI deployment gap alone. The organizations building AI today are all running into the same wall -- models that perform brilliantly in a lab and then have to survive years in the field, under real constraints, with real consequences if something breaks. That requires shared engineering principles, not competing standards. We're joining this initiative because the industry needs to align now, before deployment gaps become the reason mission-critical AI doesn't get trusted at all"

-  Emily Long, Co-Founder and CEO of Edera 

 “Metavonics agrees to participate in the AI Deployment Gap Initiative and endorses the principles outlined in the Closing the AI Deployment Gap manifesto. We authorize Lynx to identify Metavonics as a founding participant, subject to our standard review and approval of any use of our company name, logo, or attributed statements.” 

- Mohamed Eladl, Co-Founder and CEO, Metavonics

"Trusted AI is built on a continuous chain of trust, from the silicon inside connected devices, through the identities and enterprise systems that govern access and action, to the AI systems operating at the edge and the people who depend on them. Industry collaboration strengthens that chain through shared principles and practical approaches to security, governance, observability, resilience, and lifecycle assurance. We are proud to join the Lynx ecosystem initiative and contribute our experience to advancing physical AI that can be deployed, trusted, and sustained in the real world."

 - Jonathan Mulieri, Senior Vice President, AI Lifecycle Management, OmniTrust 

At PACE, we are continuously exploring and developing new technologies that help to transform the aviation market. Bridging the gap between AI innovation and real-world deployment is essential to unlocking trusted, safe, and certifiable AI for mission-critical systems. 

"AI is accelerating both vulnerability discovery and exploitation. We’re proud to join Lynx and other forward-looking companies in helping ensure AI is deployed responsibly and defended against effectively—enabling innovation while keeping critical software secure and resilient." 

- Joseph M. Saunders, Founder and CEO, RunSafe Security 

"At TASKING, we believe the real value of AI in embedded software development is not simply generating code - it is helping engineers manage the complexity of verification and validation. By combining agentic AI with deterministic, qualified tools, developers can automate repetitive design, debugging, testing and analysis tasks while keeping humans in control of the final decisions. Bridging the deployment gap to making AI practical for safety- and security-critical systems is essential for accelerating development while preserving the traceability, evidence and engineering rigor these applications demand."

-  Christoph Herzog, Co-CEO of TASKING

CSW-Logo-White
Edera-Logo-Light
_Logo-White (3)
Metavonics Logo (Framed)-1
OT Color_1
Logo_pictogram_colours_white_letters
RunSafe_Logo_OrangeWhite_2024
tasking

Hear From Members

"In safety-critical and mission-critical environments, trust must be engineered, not assumed. Dependable AI is not optional. Every decision must be predictable, verifiable, and accountable, and every part of the ecosystem must be held to that same standard. That is why Critical Software is joining Lynx's AI Deployment Gap manifesto as a founding signatory, because closing that gap takes more than one company."

-  João Galego, Head of AI at Critical Software

"No single company closes the AI deployment gap alone. The organizations building AI today are all running into the same wall -- models that perform brilliantly in a lab and then have to survive years in the field, under real constraints, with real consequences if something breaks. That requires shared engineering principles, not competing standards. We're joining this initiative because the industry needs to align now, before deployment gaps become the reason mission-critical AI doesn't get trusted at all"

-  Emily Long, Co-Founder and CEO of Edera 

 

 “Metavonics agrees to participate in the AI Deployment Gap Initiative and endorses the principles outlined in the Closing the AI Deployment Gap manifesto. We authorize Lynx to identify Metavonics as a founding participant, subject to our standard review and approval of any use of our company name, logo, or attributed statements.” 

- Mohamed Eladl, Co-Founder and CEO, Metavonics

"Trusted AI is built on a continuous chain of trust, from the silicon inside connected devices, through the identities and enterprise systems that govern access and action, to the AI systems operating at the edge and the people who depend on them. Industry collaboration strengthens that chain through shared principles and practical approaches to security, governance, observability, resilience, and lifecycle assurance. We are proud to join the Lynx ecosystem initiative and contribute our experience to advancing physical AI that can be deployed, trusted, and sustained in the real world."

 - Jonathan Mulieri, Senior Vice President, AI Lifecycle Management, OmniTrust 

At PACE, we are continuously exploring and developing new technologies that help to transform the aviation market. Bridging the gap between AI innovation and real-world deployment is essential to unlocking trusted, safe, and certifiable AI for mission-critical systems. 

"AI is accelerating both vulnerability discovery and exploitation. We’re proud to join Lynx and other forward-looking companies in helping ensure AI is deployed responsibly and defended against effectively—enabling innovation while keeping critical software secure and resilient." 

- Joseph M. Saunders, Founder and CEO, RunSafe Security 

"At TASKING, we believe the real value of AI in embedded software development is not simply generating code - it is helping engineers manage the complexity of verification and validation. By combining agentic AI with deterministic, qualified tools, developers can automate repetitive design, debugging, testing and analysis tasks while keeping humans in control of the final decisions. Bridging the deployment gap to making AI practical for safety- and security-critical systems is essential for accelerating development while preserving the traceability, evidence and engineering rigor these applications demand."

-  Christoph Herzog, Co-CEO of TASKING

 

tech-abstract

What is the Initiative

The AI Deployment Gap Initiative is a vendor-neutral industry initiative convened by Lynx to bring together organizations committed to advancing the engineering practices required to deploy trustworthy AI into real-world, mission-critical systems.

 

By providing a common foundation for discussing deployment challenges, sharing best practices, and accelerating the transition from AI innovation to operational capability, the initiative welcomes organizations across the ecosystem that share the principles outlined in the manifesto.

manifesto-1

The Manifesto

The initiative began with the publication of 'Closing the AI Deployment Gap: A Manifesto for Deployable AI.' It defines eight engineering principles including determinism by design, observability by default, runtime governance, lifecycle-ready engineering, and ecosystem collaboration. 

 

Download the Manifesto
Form Backgound Image Form Backgound Image Mobile

Become a Member

If your organization believes AI should be deployable, trusted, and sustainable in operational environments, we invite you to become part of the initiative.

 

Participation begins with conversation. There are no fees and no formal obligations.

 

Organizations may also choose to participate in joint educational activities such as technical briefs, webinars, reference architectures, and industry discussions.