AI speed. Senior judgment. Production software in 4-8 weeks.
We're a senior, nearshore studio. A senior engineer signs off on every line, with evals and a security review before anything ships, and you own 100% of the code.
- 8 yrs
- shipping at YC-backed startups
- 4-8 wks
- idea to production MVP
- Every Fri
- a live demo, every sprint
- Fixed
- scope and price, senior team only
Where the team has shipped
The problem
Building software is slow, expensive, and now risky.
- 01
Hiring a team takes months
Recruiting senior engineers burns runway you don't have. Junior freelancers are faster to hire and slower to trust.
- 02
AI-built apps break in production
A prototype is not a product. Unreviewed AI-generated code introduces security gaps and brittle architecture that becomes expensive to fix.
- 03
Agencies overpromise and underdeliver
Senior pitch, junior delivery. Open-ended invoices, no code ownership, and a relationship that ends the moment the project does.
What we do
- 01
Build your MVP
Production-ready in 4-8 weeks. Fixed scope, senior team, evals and a security review before anything ships.
See details → - 02
Add AI to your app
Working AI features in 2-6 weeks. Chat, search, summarization, document understanding, all grounded in your data so they actually work.
See details → - 03
Audit a codebase
One week. We dig into the code, flag the risks, and hand you a written assessment your team and investors can act on.
See details →
Why Basetool Labs
Why teams work with us.
- 01
A senior engineer signs off on every line
No juniors, no offshore handoffs. The engineer who talks to you is the engineer writing your code, and they review every change before it ships.
- 02
Evals and a security review before anything ships
We run automated quality evaluations and a security pass on every delivery. You don't accept risk on a demo. You accept a product that passed a real bar.
- 03
You own 100% of the code from day one
Full IP transfer, repositories, docs, and a runbook at handoff. No lock-in, no per-seat licensing on your own product, no strings.
- 04
Senior EU engineering, nearshore
Based in Constanța, Romania: EU timezone, EU data rules, English-speaking, and senior from the start. Built for founders who need EU-compliant delivery without paying West-European rates.
The process
What happens, week by week.
Week 1
Discovery & scoping. We read the codebase, interview stakeholders, and lock the build plan. You see it and approve before any code is written.
You get: a written, approved build plan and fixed scope.
Week 2
Architecture & scaffold. Core data model, auth, CI/CD pipeline, and the skeleton every feature will plug into. First Friday demo.
You get: a deployed skeleton you can log into.
Week 3
Core feature build. The one or two things the MVP has to prove. Working, deployed, and demoable.
You get: the core feature, working and demoable.
Week 4
Supporting features. The surrounding product (notifications, settings, billing hooks, integrations), enough to run a real user.
You get: a product a real user can run end to end.
Week 5
Hardening. Security review, eval suite, performance pass, error tracking, and the edge cases that matter in production.
You get: a security review, eval suite, and error tracking in place.
Week 6
Handoff. Production deploy, runbook, and a walkthrough. You own everything. Ongoing support is optional.
You get: the production app, the runbook, and full ownership.
Slack · Notion · Linear · GitHub
Demo every Friday. Commits daily.
Selected work
See all work →- Cabinetul de Traduceri2026 · June 2026
Cabinetul de Traduceri: full-site rebuild, from invisible brochure to multilingual, SEO-ready (June 2026)
Full rebuild for an authorized translation office: from a non-responsive 2010 brochure invisible to Google, to a multilingual, accessible, SEO-ready Next.js site. Every result measured, not estimated.
- Next.js 16
- React 19
- TypeScript
- Tailwind CSS
- Oceaneering2023 · 10 months (Aug 2022 - May 2023)
Shipping OceanSMART forward: frontend modernization without stopping the fleet (10 months)
Ten months as an embedded engineer on OceanSMART, a container-shipping ERP used by global logistics teams. Modernized a two-year-outdated frontend stack and shipped new tracking features in parallel, without halting the product roadmap.
- JavaScript / TypeScript
- React
- Node.js
- GraphQL
- Avo HQ2021 · 16 months (May 2020 - Aug 2021)
Avo: building a zero-maintenance Rails admin framework that teams actually keep (16 months)
Co-founded an open-source admin framework for Ruby on Rails, still shipping at avohq.io. Configuration-based, no code generation, designed so teams can extend it without owning it.
- Ruby on Rails
- Hotwire / Stimulus
- Tailwind
- PostgreSQL
Our guarantee
Trying us is almost zero-risk.
- Week 1 is a paid trial: leave with all the work, no strings.
- Fixed price, no surprise invoices.
- You own 100% of the IP from day one.
- Eval-gated delivery: we don't ship until it passes.
- We reply within one business day.
How we compare
Studio vs. in-house vs. freelancer.
| Basetool Labs | In-house team | Freelancer | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Time to start | Next week | 3-6 months to hire | Days to weeks |
| Seniority | Senior only, every role | Mixed (junior to senior) | Varies widely |
| Pricing model | Fixed scope & price | Salaried + benefits | Hourly or day rate |
| AI expertise | Built in, evals included | Depends on who you hire | Rarely specialised |
| IP / code ownership | 100% yours, from day one | Yours (employer-owned) | Contractually complex |
| Risk | Paid trial, fixed price | High hiring & exit cost | Availability & quality risk |
Who you'll work with
David Marin
Founder & Engineer
Founder of Basetool Labs (AI-augmented custom-software studio) and Sussur (a Mac-native sales coach). Eight years shipping product at YC-backed consumer and developer-tools startups: Product Engineer at The Social Cat, Software Engineer at YC W21 Waydev, co-founder of the Avo Rails admin framework. BSc Computer Science, University of Twente. Best Paper Award, IEEE SMC 2020. Four languages, Ironman finisher.
Track record
- Experience
- 8 years shipping product at YC-backed startups
- Recognition
- Best Paper Award, IEEE SMC 2020
- Open source
- Co-founded Avo, the Rails admin framework
- Education
- BSc Computer Science, University of Twente
Worked with
Past collaborators David shipped product alongside, in the roles they held at the time.
CEO & Co-founder · Waydev (YC W21)
David was a Software Engineer at Waydev (Oct 2021 - Aug 2022), migrating the main Laravel app to Octane and shipping the multi-channel notification microservice.
Founder · Avo HQ
David co-founded the open-source Rails admin framework Avo with Adrian (May 2020 - Aug 2021). Still actively maintained at avohq.io.
Co-founder · The Social Cat
David shipped product end-to-end as Product Engineer at The Social Cat, an influencer-marketing platform for small brands.
Start small
Not ready for a full build? Start with a paid Scoping & Architecture Sprint.
One week, fixed price, fully credited toward your build. You leave with a concrete plan even if you go elsewhere.
Get a ballpark in 60 seconds.
Answer a few questions, see an indicative range and timeline. No email needed for the estimate.
FAQ
Questions, answered
How fast can you ship?
Production-ready MVPs in 4 to 8 weeks, AI features in 2 to 6. We ship every week and demo every Friday, so you watch the product come together instead of waiting for one big reveal.
Do I own the code?
Yes. 100%, from day one. Full IP and repositories, plus documentation and a runbook at handoff. No lock-in, clean handover.
What if I am not technical?
Most of our clients are founders and operators, not engineers. We turn the technical decisions into plain trade-offs, so you stay in control without needing to read the code.
Why a studio instead of hiring or an agency?
You get a senior team the week you start, with no recruiting, no onboarding, and no junior churn. When the work is done, you are not stuck paying for a team you no longer need.
What happens after launch?
You get documentation, a runbook, and a clean handoff. If you want us to keep shipping or stay on call, ongoing support is available, but it is optional, never a requirement.
How do you price?
Fixed scope, fixed price, agreed before we start. Use the estimator for a ballpark, then we confirm on a call.
Is AI-written code safe?
A senior engineer reviews every line. We run evals and a security review before anything ships, so you get AI speed with senior judgment.
What if it goes wrong?
Week 1 is a paid trial: you can leave with everything we've built and pay nothing more. Fixed scope means no surprise invoices.
Tell us what you're building.
30 minutes on the calendar. No pitch. We listen, we ask questions, we tell you whether we can help.