// Orion Digital Platforms

Cloud and AI engineering for teams that can't afford to get it wrong.

We build and operate a fleet of platforms — Shortlist, Drydock, Sprintsail — and the AI practice that ships on top of them. When you hire Orion, you get the engineers who run that stack every day.

Talk to engineering See what we built
~/orion · fleet live
shortlist the talent standard ● production drydock managed cloud foundry ◐ launch-ready sprintsail typescript iac sdk + runtime ○ v1 alpha quantum leap production ai · nine layers ● engagements open
WOSB-certified · AWS Select Partner · Northern Virginia
// Built on, partnered with
AWSAmazon BedrockAnthropic ClaudeKubernetesCloud FoundryPostgreSQL
// Three platforms. One team.

The platforms we sell
are the ones we run.

~/shortlist
● production
// Shortlist

A standard for engineering ability

A verification engine: a senior-reviewed bar for what good means in a domain, and the verified pool that bar produces — feeding Orion's own teams, partner companies, and recruiter rails.

  • Assessment · lab · live session — proof, not claims
  • Human sign-off · no model decides alone
  • Internal teams · partners · recruiter rails
See Shortlist →
cf push ↗
◐ launch-ready
// Drydock

Managed Cloud Foundry on Kubernetes

Push source code, get a routed and TLS-secured app. Buildpacks under the hood. Built on Korifi (CNCF), operated by Orion. Free POC tier, production tier on-demand.

  • Same cf push · no PCF license
  • Databases, queues, storage — one command away
  • Free POC · production on-demand
See Drydock →
<sprintsail/>
○ v1 alpha
// Sprintsail

TypeScript IaC SDK + sail CLI

Declare your app — Function, Database, Bucket, Queue — then sail deploy to AWS. Migrate to a managed K8s runtime when ready. Same handler code. Apache 2.0.

  • 9 primitives · 2 targets · 1 CLI
  • sail migrate — infra, secrets, data
  • npm install @sprintsail/sdk
See Sprintsail →
// Quantum Leap Initiative

Production AI is a stack,
not a single model.

Orion builds across the nine layers — infrastructure to governance — with the evaluation discipline that keeps the system honest after the launch demo is over.

Read the playbook
// How we engage

Three ways to get cloud and AI work done.
Pick one on purpose.

Capability
Orion engagement
Typical consultancy
SaaS vendor
Operates a production platform
✓ Yes
✗ No
Yes — but rents IP to you
Same engineers from scoping to operations
✓ Yes
Handoffs to junior team
✗ No
Source-available IaC SDK (Apache 2.0)
✓ Yes
✗ No
✗ No
Verified senior talent on day one
Via Shortlist
Bench-staffed
✗ No
No proprietary lock-in
✓ Yes
Depends
✗ No
Cloud and AI under the same engagement
✓ Yes
✗ No
Single domain only
Government / WOSB eligible
✓ Yes
Sometimes
✗ No
// The engagement

From first conversation
to running production.

One team, one timeline. We scope, build, operate, and hand off — or stay on as operators if that's the deal. No rotating consultants, no hidden subcontractors.

01

Scope

A working session with the engineers who would do the build. We tell you honestly whether we can help, what it would take, and what we would not do.

02

Build

Cloud architecture delivered as code, vertical AI on Bedrock + Claude. Everything is reproducible from source — nothing hand-built in a console, nothing only one engineer understands.

03

Operate

We run the platform in production with you for as long as it takes for your team to take it over. Observability, on-call, and incident review included.

04

Hand off

Documented runbooks, source-available IaC, and a verified engineer through Shortlist if you want one on staff. No vendor lock-in either direction.

// From our notes
"The AI providers shaping the next decade are splitting into two camps — horizontal scale versus vertical depth. Pick the camp before you pick the model."
Horizontal Scale or Vertical Depth · Quantum Labs · 2026 →
// Questions worth asking

Honest answers to the
questions we get most.

Is there vendor lock-in?
No. Sprintsail SDK + CLI are Apache 2.0. Stacks you ship with us can be moved between AWS and the Sprintsail Runtime with sail migrate. Drydock runs Korifi (CNCF) — you can self-host if you want. Anything we operate, you can take over.
Will we own the IP?
Yes. You own everything we build for you, including the IaC, the code, and the runbooks. The only thing we keep is the source-available SDK and operator code (Apache 2.0) that you also get to use.
How is this different from a regular cloud consultancy?
We do the same architecture work. The difference is that we run production platforms ourselves — Sprintsail, Drydock, Shortlist — so the architecture we recommend has been operated through real outages, real cost reviews, and real audits before it ever lands in your stack.
Who actually does the work?
Same engineers from first conversation to last. No partner-led pitch and junior-staffed delivery. If we cannot staff it with our own team, we say so up front.
Do you take fixed-price work?
Sometimes. Time-and-materials for open-ended platform work; fixed-price for well-defined builds with clear acceptance criteria. We will tell you which one fits your situation.
Government contracts?
Yes. We are WOSB-certified and AWS Select Partner, eligible for federal set-aside contracts and government procurement programs.
// Dive deeper

Recent writing from the team.

Architecture 2026

A production document-intelligence stack — the nine layers, end to end.

Read →
Quantum Labs 2026

Horizontal Scale or Vertical Depth: the AI choice every leader needs to make.

Read →
Drydock 2026

Cloud Foundry on Kubernetes — the managed PaaS for secure, compliant workloads.

Read →
Shortlist 2026

Shortlist Is Live — a verified talent pipeline that kills resume theatre.

Read →
// What Orion holds constant

We don't recommend
what we don't run.

Every platform on this site was built because we needed it ourselves. We do not market what we have not operated through a real outage.

How we engage →

Tell us what you're shipping.

And what's in the way. We will tell you honestly whether we can help, what it would take, and which of our engineers would run the work.

Talk to engineering