Manual Magic AI®, a private large language model that drafts franchise operations manuals, and Claromentis, a BFA-accredited franchise management software provider, have announced a co-sell partnership effective from 1 September 2026. Manual Magic AI® now sits inside Claromentis Franchise Hub, aiming to close the gap between drafting standard operating procedures and proving, at audit, that franchisees have actually applied them.
The tie-up, announced from the companies’ base in Warwick, addresses a problem franchisors rarely admit to publicly: an operations manual gets written, then quietly falls out of use. Citing its own Franchise Digital Workplace Report 2026, Claromentis states that one in six frontline workers cannot lay their hands on the official version of a procedure when they need it most. Manual Magic AI Ltd was founded in February 2026 by Penny Hopkinson, whilst Claromentis has traded since 1998 out of Brighton, serving franchise networks that include Pharmasave, Handel’s Homemade Ice Cream and Winkworth Estate & Letting Agents.
What the Manual Magic AI and Claromentis integration includes
Manual Magic AI® ingests up to 200 authorised files at a time and drafts not just SOPs but checklists, FAQs, training storyboards and QR-code point-of-need assets, built from a franchisor’s own approved intellectual property rather than generic training content. Each document is routed through a four-stage Draft, Review, Approve, Publish workflow that records precisely who signed off which version and when, giving franchisors an audit trail rather than a static file sitting on a shared drive.
Once approved, that material becomes accessible inside Claromentis Franchise Hub, which brings together an intranet, a learning management system, process automation, e-forms, performance dashboards and AI-powered search on a single platform. The integration sits inside the Claromentis application menu and is reached through OAuth2 single sign-on, so franchisees need no separate login to find it.
Why the companies say it matters
Penny Hopkinson, founder and chief executive of Manual Magic AI Ltd and a Companion of the British Franchise Association, argues that a generalist AI tool can draft a passable procedure but cannot demonstrate, at audit, that a franchisee in a different territory actually read and applied it under pressure.
That gap, she says, is precisely what the partnership sets out to close. Nigel Davies, founder and chief executive of Claromentis, frames the problem from the other direction: his customers could already distribute, govern and measure operational content through Franchise Hub, but producing that content quickly and to a consistent standard was the piece they were missing.
Good to know
No UK law requires a franchisor to prove that a standard operating procedure was read or applied. Tools built around an audit trail, such as the one described here, are adopted as part of a franchisor’s own risk management rather than to meet a statutory disclosure duty, since none exists in the UK.
Commercial structure and reported results
The two companies describe the arrangement as a co-sell partnership rather than a referral or reseller scheme. Each invoices its own customers directly, the two subscriptions are purchased separately under each provider’s own terms, and neither business holds an equity stake in the other, a structure the companies say keeps commercial incentives on each side tied to their own product rather than to a cross-selling commission.
Manual Magic AI® runs as a private large language model, trained solely on each subscriber’s own intellectual property and hosted on UK-based cloud servers, with human review built into every stage of the workflow rather than offered as an optional safeguard. Franchisors already using the platform report SOP development time falling by up to 75%, a figure the companies attribute to their own customers’ experience rather than to any independent audit.
Reported reduction in SOP development time, according to Manual Magic AI’s own customers. Not independently audited.
The companies behind the partnership
Manual Magic AI Ltd is the technology arm of Manual Writers International®, a franchise consultancy, and was founded by Penny Hopkinson, who is also the author of Manual Magic: Create the Operations Manual Your Franchisees Need to Succeed and co-author of The AI Edge: How to Thrive within Civilization’s Next Big Disruption.
Claromentis, for its part, has built up a client base of hundreds of thousands of users worldwide over nearly three decades, and holds approved supplier status with both the British Franchise Association and the Quality Franchise Association, alongside membership of the International Franchise Association’s Supplier Forum. Neither accreditation amounts to a regulatory endorsement of the partnership itself, since franchise software providers are not subject to statutory oversight in the UK.
What happens next
The integration went live on 1 September 2026, with joint demonstrations available directly through each company’s own website rather than a single shared booking page. Manual Magic AI® remains a private deployment for each subscriber rather than a model shared across customers, and Claromentis continues to serve its existing franchise clients through the wider Franchise Hub suite regardless of whether they take up the new integration. Whether the partnership shifts how franchisors more broadly approach SOP compliance will depend on take-up across the networks each company already serves, something that will only become clear over the coming months.
Frequently asked questions about the Manual Magic AI and Claromentis partnership
Manual Magic AI® is a private large language model that drafts franchise operations manuals, standard operating procedures, checklists and training material from a franchisor’s own approved intellectual property, rather than from generic training content.
Claromentis Franchise Hub is a franchise management software platform that combines an intranet, a learning management system, process automation, e-forms and performance dashboards, used by franchise networks to distribute and monitor operational content.
No. There is no UK statute requiring a franchisor to evidence that a standard operating procedure has been read or applied. Audit trail tools of this kind are adopted voluntarily as part of a franchisor’s own risk management.
A co-sell partnership is a commercial arrangement in which two companies market complementary products together without either referring customers for a commission or taking an equity stake in the other, each continuing to invoice its own customers directly.
