Studio
Founded in Lagos in 2026. Founder-led, which means the person you talk to on day one is the person accountable for the work on day one hundred.
Zynterra was founded on a simple observation: most software doesn't fail at launch. It fails six months later, when nobody's watching. So we build for month six.
It's a studio, not an agency, on purpose. An agency scales by adding account managers between you and the people doing the work. A studio stays small enough that the person who scoped your project is still the person accountable for it a year in.
We work with startups that need a technical partner, and with established businesses whose software has become a liability instead of an asset. We also invest in our own products, Zorva and AuditGate, because building for ourselves keeps our standards honest.
The name comes from terra, meaning ground. It's in the logo, and it's in the work: software worth standing on.
- Founded
- 2026
- RC Number
- 9709365
- Base
- Lagos, Nigeria
- Timezone
- WAT (UTC+1)
- Structure
- Founder-led
- Status
- Active on the CAC Register
- Products
- Zorva · AuditGate
Founder
Akintola Stephen Iyanu
Founder and engineer at Zynterra. He works across the stack, from the escrow logic inside Zorva to the proxy layer inside AuditGate, and takes the first call on every new project himself. Founder-led is a structural fact here, not a marketing line: there is no layer between the person who scopes the work and the person accountable for it.
How we work
The same four stages, in detail.
Nothing about the sequence changes between projects. What changes is how long each stage takes.
Discovery
A short, structured discovery sprint. We ask the questions that change the build: who's using this, what happens at ten times the load, what's the cost of getting it wrong. The output is a written scope, a price, and a definition of done, agreed before a line of code is written.
Weekly shipping
Every week ends with something you can click through, not a slide about progress. Feedback comes from using the real thing early, when it's still cheap to change direction.
Clean handover
Tested, documented, deployed to infrastructure you own. Handover includes the code, the credentials, the architecture decision records, and a recorded walkthrough, not a folder of loose ends.
Keep it standing
Monitoring and alerting in place before launch, not bolted on after the first outage. Ongoing maintenance and support run as a retainer for as long as you need it.
Working rhythm
What a week looks like.
- A weekly demo of working software, not a status meeting about it
- Written updates you can read in two minutes
- One shared channel for the whole project. No hunting across email, chat, and a ticketing tool
- Decisions recorded in writing as they're made, not reconstructed from memory later
Engineering standards
What we hold ourselves to.
These do not change with the language, the client, or the deadline. They are the part of the work you are actually paying for.
Working across timezones
Lagos runs on WAT (UTC+1), which overlaps comfortably with the working day in Europe and the eastern Americas. We reply within one business day regardless of where you are.
- 01Typed languages by default. TypeScript, not JavaScript with good intentions
- 02Tests required on anything that touches money or authentication
- 03Code review before merge, with no exceptions for deadlines
- 04Structured logging from day one, not added when something breaks
- 05Monitoring and alerting configured before launch, not after the first incident
- 06Architecture decision records for anything expensive to reverse later
- 07No secrets committed to source control, ever
- 08Dependencies audited on a schedule, not only when a CVE makes the news
Tools we use — nothing exotic on purpose
The languages and frameworks we reach for first live on the Services page, along with everything else we have shipped in. Neither list is a boundary.
FAQ
Fair questions, plain answers.
01How do you charge?
Fixed price for well-defined scopes, monthly retainer for ongoing build-and-run work. Either way, the number is agreed in writing before work starts, and scope changes are priced before they happen, never after.
02How long does a typical project take?
Discovery takes one to two weeks. A first working version of most products ships in six to twelve weeks, depending on scope. You'll see working software weekly from the start, so there's no waiting until the end to find out.
03Do you work with clients outside Nigeria?
Yes. We're based in Lagos (WAT, UTC+1) and work remotely with clients anywhere. Our timezone overlaps comfortably with Europe and the eastern Americas.
04Can you take over an existing codebase?
Yes. It's some of our most common work. We start with a paid technical review so you get an honest written assessment of what you have, then a plan to stabilise, improve, or rebuild. Sometimes the honest answer is "keep it"; we'll say that too.
05Who owns the code and infrastructure?
You do, from day one. Repositories, cloud accounts, and credentials sit under your ownership, and documentation is part of the deliverable, not an extra.
06Who owns the intellectual property?
You do. Whatever we build for you under a project agreement is yours on delivery. We don't retain rights to reuse your specific implementation, though we naturally keep the general knowledge and patterns we bring to every project.
07Do you sign NDAs?
Yes, routinely, and often before we've seen the details of a brief. If confidentiality matters to you, say so on the first call.
08Can you work alongside our existing team?
Yes. We're used to plugging into a team that already has its own conventions and code review process. We'll adapt to how you work rather than asking you to adapt to us.
09What happens if the project runs late?
You hear about the risk as soon as we see it, not at the deadline. Weekly shipping means a slipping timeline is visible early, while there's still time to adjust scope or resource rather than absorb a surprise.
10What if we need to pause a project?
Tell us and we pause. Fixed-price work resumes where it left off; retainers simply stop billing. There's no penalty for a client's business needing to change course.
11Do you offer maintenance only, without a new build?
Yes. Some clients come to us with software that already works and just needs to keep working: monitoring, dependency updates, incident response. That's a standard retainer.
12How do you handle data protection under NDPR?
We design for data minimisation by default: collect what's needed, nothing more, and build in the ability to export or erase a user's data on request. See our Security and data protection page for the detail.
13What is AuditGate, and can I try it?
AuditGate is our API security platform, currently in development. It sits in front of your API as a transparent proxy, inspects traffic in real time, and surfaces vulnerabilities in plain English, with the exact file and line to fix when your repo is connected. It will be free to start at launch. Join the waitlist by email and you'll be first in.
14What is Zorva?
Zorva is our escrow platform for Nigerian commerce: a secure link that holds the buyer's money until both sides agree, then pays the seller instantly by bank transfer. It's currently in development. It's built for how Nigeria actually trades: WhatsApp, Instagram, card, transfer, and USSD.