Microsoft Foundry engineering
Models, agents, evaluations, and guardrails in Microsoft Foundry, formerly Azure AI Foundry, grounded in your own data and kept inside your boundary.
Short answer
Microsoft Foundry, formerly Azure AI Foundry, is Microsoft's platform for deploying models, building agents, and running evaluations in Azure. Puget Sound AI builds Foundry solutions grounded in SharePoint and internal documents, connected to Copilot Studio agents, with guardrails and audit logging, in commercial Azure or Azure Government.
The hard part is the data path, not the model.
Foundry provides the model and agent layer behind Copilot Studio agents and custom AI workflows. Grounding it in your data takes classified document stores, a controlled vector index, and retrieval that respects the same access controls as your Microsoft 365 tenant. That integration is where most projects stall.
For government tenants, Foundry runs in Azure Government, and model availability differs from commercial Azure. We confirm the catalog before committing to an architecture.
What the engagement covers.
- Foundry resources and projects, with Foundry roles assigned on least privilege
- Grounding against SharePoint, Exchange, and internal document stores
- Vector index construction that respects Purview classification
- Retrieval pipelines connected to Copilot Studio agents
- Evaluations and guardrails on models and agents
- Audit logging for inference and retrieval, plus data residency documentation
Engagement path.
Foundry work is often scoped inside an AI Jumpstart when it sits behind Copilot Studio agents. Standalone work starts with a scoping call.
| Engagement | Price |
|---|---|
| Scoping callTwenty minutes to decide whether Foundry or native Copilot Studio retrieval fits. | No cost |
| Foundry buildGrounded models or agents with evaluations and guardrails. | Scoped |
| AI JumpstartFoundry alongside Copilot Studio agents, six to eight weeks. | $30,000 to $60,000 |
Microsoft Foundry questions
What is Microsoft Foundry?
Microsoft Foundry, formerly Azure AI Foundry, is Microsoft's platform in Azure for deploying models, building agents, and running evaluations and guardrails.
Is Microsoft Foundry available for government?
Yes, in Azure Government, which is FedRAMP High authorized. The model catalog differs from commercial Azure and changes often, so we confirm specific models and regions during scoping.
When do we need Foundry instead of Copilot Studio alone?
Most document question and policy agents work well in Copilot Studio alone. Foundry earns its place when you need specific models, evaluations, large document pipelines, or direct model access from your own applications.
Does Microsoft train models on our prompts?
Microsoft states that prompts and completions sent to Azure OpenAI models in Foundry are not used to train models. We document data residency and logging for each model you use during the build.
Train your team first.
Developers and technical admins can learn Foundry projects, models, and evaluations in one day.
Train your team on the AI you already pay for.
Tell us who needs training and we will send a recommended program and a fixed price. Or book 20 minutes and talk it through.