AI & technology company · Founded 2026

Most products skip the developing world. We don’t.

Ebenworks is an AI and technology company. We build software for the people the industry overlooks: our own products, and the platforms we build for our partners.

See the products What we build →

One company — everything we’ve built.

Two products live. Here’s where they stand.

The actual numbers from the products, as of May 2026.

Live products: 2
Pilot merchants: 100+
Tests passing: 1,400+
Languages live: 4

Built POPIA- and PIPA-compliant from day one. 1,400+ tests passing; no known dependency CVEs.

Two live products. Built for real use.

Both products →

Livesince Apr 202601 / Fintech · SA

Imali on WhatsApp — the menu, an April 2026 monthly report, and a chat with the Imali assistant

Informal SMEs: 1.6M
Merchants: 100+
Languages: 3

WhatsApp business OS · POPIA-first

The WhatsApp business OS for SA’s 1.6 M informal merchants (~1.2–1.3 M reachable on WhatsApp).

Track income, expenses, invoices, inventory, taxes, all through a WhatsApp message. English, isiZulu & isiXhosa.

Gauteng, Western Capeimali.ebstar.co

Deployedsince Mar 202602 / Voice AI · KR

Chingu's Korean app — the activity log, the daily home screen, and the conversation history

Addressable: 2.3M
Target: ~700ms
Tests: 230+

Korean voice AI · PIPA-compliant

“Chingu-ya.” One word is enough. (Korean: 친구야, “hey friend.”)

Korean-native voice AI checks on seniors living alone every day, and notifies welfare workers and families the moment something changes. Deployed in production; recruiting its first municipal pilot.

Seoul · recruiting pilotchingu-ai.ebstar.co

What we know how to ship.

in production, not in slides

Applied AI in production

GPT-4o-mini reading real receipts; a Korean voice pipeline under load. Models doing work people depend on, not demos.

Conversational products

WhatsApp and voice, on surfaces people already use. No new app to download, no manual to read.

Regulated-market builds

POPIA, PIPA, SARS, KONEPS. Compliance designed in from day one, not bolted on later.

Full-stack platforms

Next.js, FastAPI, Postgres. Shipped, deployed, and running under real load.

How we work.

01 · Discover

Start with the person

We start with the person the software ignores, and the constraint they actually live with.

02 · Design

Build it together

We shape the product, the system, and the compliance together, not bolted on after.

03 · Ship

Deploy and improve

We deploy to production and keep improving under real load.

One AI/ML engineer. The whole stack.

Ebenworks builds useful technology for the people most software ignores. The user is the constant; the industry is the variable.

Background: AI/ML engineer · MSc, Korea University
Roots: Bulawayo → Johannesburg → Seoul
Recognition: Forbes BLK 2024 · MSc in AI, Korea University
Ships: Imali & Chingu, end-to-end

Loneliness shrinks when someone is next to you. Technology can hold that seat, at least until a human can.Ebenezer Tarubinga, on building Chingu