A consultant who ships, not slides.
Moonlabs is the operator-led AI Academy in Derby. We run three live companies — Homemove, home.co.uk and homedata.co.uk — and we teach twelve students per cohort to ship a real AI product, sell it to a real customer, and raise on it. Three pillars: Coding, Commercials, Investment. Twelve weeks. £6,000.
Moonlabs is what we are. Two operators — James Freestone and Louis O’Connell-Bristow — who run Homemove, home.co.uk and homedata.co.uk, have raised £5m+ for our own companies, and are exactly the kind of operator your clients hire McKinsey to recommend they hire.
The Academy is what we do. A twelve-week, in-person, twelve-student cohort in Derby. You build a real AI product. You sign a paid pilot on it. You write a deck and a financial model. You leave with a deployed system, a paying customer reference and a live investor pipeline. Coding, Commercials, Investment — the three pillars taught in equal weight every week.
Why this page exists. Strategy consultants are some of the most commercially-fluent people in any room and almost none of them can ship the AI systems they recommend. The asymmetry is uncomfortable: clients can tell the difference between a deck that names the right vendors and a partner who has actually built one of these things, and they are starting to ask the harder question. Some Academy graduates go back to MBB and Big-4 as the senior with shipping credibility. Some leave to found AI-native consultancies. Some join the Moonlabs portfolio. All of them stop writing the same maturity-model slide.
Coding · from slide to system
You already write the recommendation. In twelve weeks you build it. Production AI on the same stack the Palantir / Anthropic / OpenAI / Snowflake decks reference — chunking, evals, agents, observability, deploy. A deployed product by week twelve that reshapes every vendor conversation you have afterwards.
Commercials · the AI-native consultancy economics
AI-native consultancies (Helicone, Faculty AI, Mantle, Polymath) charge two or three multiples on MBB rates with a fraction of the team. We teach pricing the implementation, productising the engagement, the one-page pilot, the first paying customer. A paid pilot by week six — for many, sold back to a client you already know.
Investment · raising on operator credibility
Cap table from week two, ten-slide deck (the one you have written but never written for yourself), financial model, term sheets walked line by line. Investors back ex-MBB founders who have actually shipped — we know which UK funds and angels do this thesis and we make warm introductions. A live investor pipeline by demo day.
Common questions.
I am still at MBB / Big-4. Can I do this during a leave of absence?
Several past students have. The Academy fits well into a sabbatical, a between-projects gap, or a planned exit. Talk to us about your specific situation.
I am ex-consulting and considering a pivot. Is the Academy the right shape?
Often yes. Ex-consultants are some of our strongest graduates — they arrive with commercial fluency and leave with the engineering layer that was missing. Many move into AI-native operator or founder roles afterwards.
How does this compare to a top-tier MBA?
An MBA gives you a brand. The Academy gives you a deployed product. Different artefacts; many strong consultants do both. The honest comparison is here.
Can my firm sponsor me?
Several firms have funded senior consultants through the Academy as part of AI upskilling budgets, or via the Apprenticeship Levy where it applies. Full funding routes here.
I want to start my own AI consultancy. Should I do the Academy or just start?
Both work. The Academy is the twelve-week shortcut: you leave with a deployed product, paying pilots, a deck, and a network of operators. Starting cold takes longer; the trade-off is the £6,000 tuition.
More Academy entry points.
The Academy is one course with many doors. Each of these pages is a different entry point into the same twelve weeks.
AI Course For Academics And Researchers
AI Course For Finance Professionals
AI Course For Data Analysts
AI Course For Marketers
AI Course For Creative Industries
AI Course For Product Managers
Build it. Sell it. Raise on it. In twelve weeks.
Tell us where you are in your consulting career and what AI tool you would build next — whether to take back to the firm or to take to market yourself. James and Louis read every application personally and reply inside the week.
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