Version the boundary before the number: which geographies, which buyer types, which adjacent categories count, then derive top-down and bottom-up apart and hand the reconciled estimate to the analyst who accepts it.
A market is sized, and the boundary that produced the number is written down beside it.
02
A definition shifts, and the older figure and the newer one stop being comparable.
Reason
03
A top-down build is raised, and a bottom-up one rises apart from it, never off the same base.
04
A residual opens between the two builds, and it is reported at its width rather than averaged away.
05
A forecast is drawn, and every assumption sitting under its base year travels with it.
Decide
06
A source ages, and each estimate leaning on that source is flagged for re-derivation.
07
A figure is reused in a planning paper, and the day it was derived is carried alongside it.
Out
08
A market resists definition, and that resistance is recorded as the finding, not as a gap.
09
Execute write actions only inside the approval boundaries agreed during implementation.
→Product statement
Derivation, reconciliation and versioning belong to the agent. Acceptance belongs to a named analyst, who takes the estimate into the plan and owns it there.
Example workflow
One estimate, sources to acceptance
AgentHuman
1Source material receivedTrade series, filings, panel data, tender registers or internal sales history
2Definition fixed and versionedThe geographies, the buyer types, the adjacent categories counted in and the day that boundary was set
3Two builds raised apartThe top-down build, the bottom-up build, the residual and its width
4Controls appliedBoundary checks, source-age checks, arithmetic checks and derivation confidence
No human action required
Stages 1 to 4 run unaided, and nothing enters a plan at any of them — the agent is deriving, and the analyst lane opens at the reconciliation gate.
5DecisionSplits at the reconciliation gate
Residual within tolerance
Goes to the named analyst to accept.
Anything wide
Adds a senior analyst read first.
Analyst review
The estimate is held with its definition, its residual and the sources it was drawn from.
Accept · Append source · Send to analyst review
Accepted — by the named analyst▼
6Planning and model records updatedOnly where write access and records policy allow it
7Outcome evaluatedDefinition stability, source currency, analyst corrections and what review found
Corrections
Each analyst correction is counted in the evaluation.
What should not run autonomously
Human approval stays in control
Outside the boundary — human approval required8 items
Accepting an estimate into the planning cycle.
Setting the boundary a market is reported at.
Deciding which adjacent category counts as in.
Signing off a forecast for a board paper.
Automation boundaryAgent acts unaided
✓Write the market definition down and version it.
✓Raise the top-down and the bottom-up builds on separate bases.
✓Report the residual between the two builds at its measured width.
✓Flag any figure whose source has aged past its term.
Nothing enters a planning paper except by a named analyst, inside the agreed boundaries.
Judging whether a market can be defined at all.
Telling a board that an estimate is defensible.
Choosing the growth rate a forecast is built on.
Changes to the plan, the model or the definition.
Example output
One market estimate, annotated
This serves a strategy team who may have to defend a number in a planning paper years after it was drawn; below is one estimate exactly as the agent leaves it.
Market estimate · single segmentIllustrative example
Estimate
Recorded as
Segment
Evidence of record
Confidence
Held for
Serviceable market, mid-market buyers
Reconciled across both builds
Boundary, versioned
Trade series, 3 August 2026
Held unaccepted
The named analyst, by name
As receivedBuilt from a published trade series and internal sales history, and it claims nothing beyond them.
What the record holdsTrade seriesSales historyTender register
Why no acceptance hereTaking a number into the plan is a judgement a named analyst makes.
ActionAcceptAppend sourceSend to analyst review
What the score decidesBelow the configured threshold an estimate gets a senior read before the analyst sees it.
Value
Where AI adds value
The same four claims, placed at the point in the workflow where each one applies.
Where the value landsValue 01 – 04
Every estimateFrom the source that carries it
03Evidence
Where the evidence is used
The agent does not vouch for a source, only for what that source says, when it said it, and how the estimate was built from it.
01Approved path
A market is a definition
Move the geography, the buyer type or the question of whether services count, and the number moves too, with nobody having lied.
02Human review
What was checked, and not found
No published series consulted gives one agreed boundary for this category, and they do not treat services alike, so the spread between them is reported rather than a consensus figure that none of them supports.
04Build an evidence trail
The estimate, the definition it rests on and the analyst who accepted it stay together.
Integrations
Typical integrations
Five system groups connect to the same agent. Which of them are in scope is decided in discovery.
Published statisticsTrade bodies · government series Category and geography series
Internal commercial dataCRM · billing · sales history Won and lost demand records
Panel and survey dataResearch panels · buyer surveys Buyer populations and purchase rates
Agent
Market sizing and segmentation
Reads the sources Raises both builds Holds for the analyst
Tenders and public filingsTender registers · annual reports Competitor and tender disclosures
A segment-level definition-stability figure can read clean while emerging adjacent categories carry most of the re-derivation. Nestack reports the correction rate by segment, not only in total.
Slice performance — reported separately, not only in aggregateIllustrative example
Slice
Failure rate
Lift
Lift vs. threshold
Status
Emerging adjacent categories
11.6%
3.7×
Review
Multi-country roll-ups
8.3%
2.6×
Review
Services-inclusive segments
5.2%
1.7×
Watch
Established core categories
2.4%
0.8×
Normal
Bar: correction-rate lift vs. established-category baseline · scale 0–4.0× · tick marks the 2.0× review threshold2 of 4 slices over threshold
Evidence-linked improvement
What a widened boundary costs
A cycle shuts when the undefined market is a regression case. That suite is what the next estimate issued is measured against.
Improvement cycle · five stagesSwitchback — the path turns at Improve and returns at Learn
01Detect
Correction rate rises on emerging adjacent categories.
02Diagnose
The market that grew by a third because somebody quietly widened what counted is worked backwards until one cause is left standing.
03Improve
The change ships numbered, and the estimates that forced it ride with it.
04Verify
Nothing releases while one touched estimate case is still red.
05Learn
It is retained for good, and the definition rules are amended in that same commit.
Learn → DetectThe return edge. The next estimate is measured against a suite one case longer.
Typical build scope
Twelve workstreams across six weeks
The build scope read against the delivery timeline. Week structure follows the six-week plan — discovery, sources, estimate derivation, evaluation, integration, then production validation and handover.
WorkstreamWeek 1Week 2Week 3Week 4Week 5Week 6
01Market-definition and automation-boundary work.
02Statistical, panel and internal sources.
03Source-to-estimate and definition-coverage mapping.
04Market source ingestion.
05Definition, source and segment binding.
06Residual scoring and review routing.
07Analyst acceptance workflow.
08Planning-model integration.
09Definition and boundary cases.
10Guardrails and acceptance controls.
11Estimate-trail instrumentation.
12Deployment, documentation and Agent Care handover.
12 workstreams · 6 weeks · bar shows the weeks a workstream is active — several run in parallelFinal scope and sequence confirmed in discovery
Engagement tiers
What each tier includes
Rows are the capabilities named in each tier's scope. Higher tiers include everything below them.
Capability✓ in scope · — not at this tierPilotOne segment, one cycleProductionProduction planning workflowAdvancedMultiple segments / geographies
Introduced at Pilot
Estimate derivation to your definitions✓✓✓
Named analyst acceptance✓✓✓
Segment-definition baseline✓✓✓
Introduced at Production
Reporting by segment—✓✓
Analyst review workflow in your systems—✓✓
Approved write-back—✓✓
Source-library integration—✓✓
Introduced at Advanced
Multi-source reconciliation——✓
Cross-segment estimate packs——✓
Large source libraries——✓
Multi-geography definition controls——✓
Build priceFrom $5,000From $8,000Custom quote
Final build priceConfirmed after discovery based on integrations, workflow complexity, source volume, approval controls and deployment requirements.
Separate from buildBuild pricing is separate from recurring Agent Care, which covers managed monitoring, evaluations, incidents and verified improvements after launch.
What we need from you
What you bring, and what we build with it
Each input maps to a piece of build scope and a week in the delivery timeline.
You bringWe build with it
01Your live segments and the definition each is reported at→Definition capture and boundary versioningWeek 1
02Representative statistical, panel and internal sources→Source binding, build logic and the estimate baselineWeek 2
03Your planning calendar and the analysts it names→Definition mapping, source binding and the automation boundaryWeek 1
04Access to relevant APIs, feeds or exports→Statistical, panel and internal source assessment, then integration setupWeek 2
05Estimates you would not want defended→Boundary cases and failure-mode testingWeek 4
06What no market estimate may establish→Residual scoring, review routing, guardrails and release controlsWeek 3
07A named analyst who accepts the estimate→Release to the named analyst, then pilot and production validationWeeks 5–6
Nothing else is requiredDeployment, documentation and Agent Care handover are ours.
Delivery timeline
Four phases across six weeks
Nothing below is padded to fill a row: where two phases genuinely coincide, they share week five.
PhaseW1W2W3W4W5W6
DiscoveryW1
BuildW2 – W3
EvaluateW4 – W5
Pilot & LaunchW5 – W6
Week focusW1Definition discovery, boundary versioning and the automation boundaryW2Source integration and the segment-definition baselineW3Estimate derivation, reconciliation logic and release controlsW4Evaluation suite, boundary cases and failure-mode testingW5Planning-model integration, pilot estimates and targeted correctionsW6One planning cycle run under the strategy lead, then Agent Care handover
Reading the bandEach bar covers only the weeks its own work is named for, and week five is shared by design.
At the end of W6Validation closes on live estimates, and Agent Care picks up the watch.
DurationSix-week plan shown · typical delivery 4–6 weeks depending on scope confirmed in discovery.
Next step · Strategy AI agent
Build a market analysis agent around the definition your last estimate never wrote down.
Show us one market you size every year and the definition behind the last number. If that figure has ridden through more than one planning cycle without being re-derived, then it is being trusted rather than defended. A market that cannot be defined comes back as a finding.
