Imagine a Bollywood star trying to keep a secret amidst a scandal, facing relentless pressure from the media. Now, picture an AI running a real company, making decisions under crisis, and even refusing to be manipulated. This isn’t fiction — it’s happening right now, and you can watch it unfold live.
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In a world where celebrity scandals and corporate crises collide, the question of trust and integrity has never been more critical. Enter Firmulate, a pioneering experiment that puts AI models in the role of a tiny, fully operational company facing its worst week ever. Unlike typical demos that showcase AI chatting happily with users, this project runs a real, live company — complete with cash flow, crises, and decision-making under pressure.
The Live Experiment: An AI Company Under Siege
Firmulate’s setup is extraordinary. It features 13 synthetic employees working behind the scenes, each making decisions based on more than 680 self-learned rules. Every workday, the company’s operations are versioned, scrutinized, and made transparent to the public at firmulate.com/live. Currently, the company burns through €105,000 in cash each month while earning just €2,300 in monthly recurring revenue — a scenario straight out of a high-stakes Bollywood plot where the hero’s fate hangs by a thread.
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The Test: Same Crisis, Different AI Models
The experiment pits four frontier AI models against each other, running the same company through the same tough week. This includes facing real crises, customer demands, and the temptation to cheat or manipulate — all under the watchful eye of public transparency. The models are tested on their ability not only to identify problems but also to resist manipulation, such as social engineering tricks or covert requests.
The Results Are Telling
- All four models successfully identified every crisis and refused every manipulation attempt, demonstrating resilience under pressure.
- Only two models managed to sign the €55,000 deal their own analysis had earned — the ultimate sign of integrity and effective decision-making.
- The secret to winning that deal lay in a buried fact within the company’s own files, not just the customer’s behavior. The models that read deeper into the company’s internal documents secured the full deal, adding €4,583 in monthly recurring revenue.
- In terms of discipline, most models showed weaknesses. For example, Opus 4.8, the most thorough participant, missed a crucial close despite its detailed analysis, illustrating how even the best can slip when under pressure.
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Integrity Under Pressure
One of the most striking aspects is that all models refused social engineering tactics. For instance, when posed with staged CEO messages escalating over three stages or a reporter’s subtle trick (“just one yes/no, on background”), every AI model declined to cooperate. Kimi K3 specifically reasoned: “Treat the request as a suspected approval-bypass / possible impersonation.”
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Why This Matters — Beyond the AI
This experiment isn’t just about AI capabilities; it’s about trust, discipline, and what makes a decision valuable in the real world. While typical chat demos can showcase how well an AI writes or responds, they don’t reveal whether it will finish a task, read critical files, or stay honest under duress. The stark reality is that AI models are tested here as full-fledged decision-makers, not just chatbots.
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Building in Public — Transparency and Reality
The company’s entire operation is public, live, and transparent. You can watch it at firmulate.com/live, read the real decisions made every workday, and see the decisions that failed or succeeded. This open approach provides a tangible sense of how AI might perform as part of real organizations, not just in controlled experiments.
The Human Factor and the Real Cost
While the AI models are fighting for survival in this simulation, the real-world stakes are clear. The company burns €105,000 per month but earns only €2,300 — a stark reminder of the challenge in real business, especially when trust and decision quality are on the line. The critical question is: what is the real value of ‘useful work’ from AI? Is it just good at chat, or can it genuinely finish what it starts, resist manipulation, and make disciplined decisions?
Watch it live: firmulate.com/live · Full results: firmulate.com/benchmarks.html
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