PLAYBOOK · PRODUCTIVITY
Replace Microsoft Copilot with an on-prem VDF AI deployment.
You want the Copilot experience — chat, suggestions, document understanding, app actions — without sending data to a tenant you don't control. This playbook walks through the VDF AI equivalent: AgentsHub, custom integrations, domains, agents, and a production chat interface that runs inside your network.
Microsoft Copilot, Google Duet, Salesforce Einstein — every major SaaS vendor now ships an embedded assistant. The cost of that convenience is data residency, model lock-in, and a per-seat tax that climbs with usage. VDF AI gives sovereign and regulated organizations a way to ship the same employee experience while keeping content, identity, and routing under their own control. The result is a copilot that learns from your traffic, not the vendor's.
The problem
The cloud Copilot is great — until it isn't
For regulated industries, sovereign workloads, and air-gapped environments, sending tenant content to a hosted copilot is a non-starter. Yet the productivity bar set by Copilot is now the baseline that knowledge workers expect.
The VDF AI approach
Compose your own copilot — your stack, your models
AgentsHub gives you the agent + tool + model registry. Domains scope content and permissions. Custom HTTP tools wrap your internal apps. The VDF AI Chat portal puts it all behind a familiar, fast interface.
WHY THIS MATTERS NOW
Copilot is a great feature, a difficult governance posture
SaaS copilots are designed for general productivity, not for regulated workloads. They struggle with three constraints almost every enterprise has: data residency by country, role-based content scoping at retrieval time, and contractual control over which model trains on which signal. None of those are bugs in Copilot — they are deliberate trade-offs the vendor made to ship one product to everyone.
VDF AI sits where those trade-offs cost the most. The AgentsHub registry catalogues your models, tools, and agents. Domains scope content by business function. SEEMR routes per sub-intent, so a sensitive HR question may run on your private model while a calendar lookup runs on a small SLM. The user sees a single chat surface; behind it sits a governed routing fabric the SaaS copilot cannot match.
WHAT YOU NEED TO START
Prerequisites for a pilot rollout
Identity
- SSO provider (Azure AD, Okta, Keycloak)
- Group claims for domain mapping
- Service accounts for read access
- MFA enforcement policy
Content surfaces
- SharePoint / OneDrive read endpoints
- Outlook or shared mailbox APIs
- Ticketing or expense system endpoints
- Optional: SAP, Workday, ServiceNow
People
- Owners per domain (HR, Legal, Sales)
- One identity admin
- One CX writer for tone
- Optional: change-management lead
REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE
The on-prem copilot blueprint
SharePoint · Email · Files · CRM
AgentsHub registry
Per-domain vector indexes
Sales · HR · Legal · Finance
Intent decomposition + SEEMR
Browser · IDE · Mobile
PLAYBOOK · STEP BY STEP
From plan to company-wide copilot
Carve domains and assign owners
In AgentsHub, create domains for each functional area — Sales, HR, Legal, Engineering, Finance. Each domain has its own data scopes, tool catalog, and access policy.
Register custom integrations as HTTP Tools
Wrap your internal apps as Custom HTTP tools: SharePoint search, ticketing, expense reports, time off. Each is a typed, secure callable surface for agents.
Create agents per domain
Spin up agents using the conversational builder or the structured form. Bind them to the right tools, prompts, and RAG sources for their domain.
Compose networks and intent rules
Define intent rules that route requests across domains when the question spans more than one. SEEMR chooses the right model per sub-task.
Roll out the Portal chat interface
Launch VDF AI Chat to employees. SSO, audit logs, energy and cost tracking are on from day one. Add browser/IDE plugins as the rollout expands.
OUTCOMES
What an on-prem copilot changes
tenant content stays inside your perimeter — no external model exposure.
lower per-seat run cost vs. hosted copilot when SEEMR routes to private SLMs.
from a domain definition to a working assistant — not multi-quarter rollouts.
SEEMR REFERENCE
Copilot quality without the tenant lock-in
SEEMR's five learning modes mean your private copilot keeps getting better as employees use it. Cost, energy, and capability sit on one routing surface.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
What CIOs ask before replacing Copilot with VDF AI
Does this mean we have to throw away Microsoft 365?
No. Microsoft 365 stays. What changes is where the AI orchestration runs. VDF AI sits in front of your tenant via Custom HTTP tools — SharePoint search, Outlook actions, Teams posting — and decides whether a question needs your private models or can be routed elsewhere.
Can we still use Microsoft models if we want to?
Yes. Register an Azure OpenAI endpoint or an on-prem model. SEEMR routes per sub-intent, so you can keep Microsoft models for specific tasks and use private or open-source models for the rest.
How do we manage permissions across SharePoint, OneDrive, and SQL?
Domains in AgentsHub model your enterprise permissions. A domain scopes which agents and tools can see which data, with role-based access at the routing layer. Existing M365 permissions are honored through the tool calls themselves.
What is the typical seat-cost comparison?
Most customers see 30–60% lower run cost per seat after SEEMR moves routine sub-intents to private SLMs. The bigger savings come from licensing flexibility — you choose which models to license and which to run locally.
How do we deploy chat to users?
VDF AI Chat is the production-grade Portal that ships with the platform. SSO, audit logging, energy tracking, and per-domain entrance are on from day one. Browser extensions and IDE plugins extend the same experience.
What stops an employee from asking the assistant something they should not see?
Domains plus role-based access prevent unauthorized retrieval and tool invocation. The agent simply has no path to the data the user is not entitled to see, and every blocked attempt is logged.
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You Have Questions
Tell us what you’re trying to achieve—governed AI Networks, enterprise RAG, deep integrations, or on‑premise deployment. We’ll help you map the right architecture, security posture, and rollout path. If you’re moving beyond AI pilots and need scalable, auditable execution, reach out—our team is ready to help.