OpenAI’s Agent Platform Battles Claude Cowork in Fierce AI Autonomy War

As OpenAI launched its new enterprise platform called Frontier on February 5, 2026, the competition in the AI agent market has intensified. The platform aims to help large companies build, deploy, and manage AI agents without overhauling their existing systems. Frontier works as an open system that supports agents built outside of OpenAI and connects to external data and applications.

The platform treats AI agents similar to human employees. It provides onboarding, feedback loops, and permission settings. Early users report impressive results, with some companies achieving 90% time efficiency gains and saving up to 1,500 hours monthly in product development.

Frontier connects to various business tools like data warehouses, CRM systems, and ticketing platforms. This creates a shared business context and institutional memory, helping agents understand company workflows. The platform handles identity and governance with specific permissions for regulated environments. Similar to Europe’s initiatives to reduce dependence on foreign technology through the EU Chips Act, Frontier aims to provide technological autonomy for businesses in the AI space.

Companies can use Frontier to automate complex processes in revenue operations, customer support, and procurement. It supports tasks in data analysis, financial forecasting, and software engineering. The system integrates with existing business records to reduce cycle time and costs. Major corporations including HP and Uber are among the notable early customers using the platform.

Security is a major focus for Frontier. It meets multiple standards including SOC 2 Type II and ISO/IEC certifications. The platform prevents over-permissioning and manages risk in regulated settings through enterprise identity and access management. Users are advised to implement proper secrets management and store API keys using “.env” files to ensure secure credentials handling.

OpenAI’s move comes as competition heats up among AI companies targeting business clients. Frontier positions itself as an enterprise operating system for agent orchestration. The launch included partnership announcements with ServiceNow and Snowflake.

The platform connects with common tools like Google Drive, Dropbox, and Microsoft Teams using OAuth2 and API keys. It supports webhooks and provides dashboards for monitoring. Frontier is compatible with Redis for session management and can export to cloud services like AWS Lambda and Azure Functions.