Are forward deployed engineers flirting with failure?

Gartner warns that vendor-led forward deployed engineer (FDE) programs are proving costly and less effective than expected, and predicts most companies will abandon the model by 2028. For CIOs and technology leaders, the strategic takeaway is to treat FDEs as a temporary acceleration mechanism rather than a long-term operating model, and to reassess whether these teams are delivering enough business value to justify the expense. IT organizations may need to shift focus toward building internal product, integration, and customer-implementation skills so they are less dependent on vendor-embedded expertise.