Made by people who build
Artwork: Peter Paul Rubens
centaur.africa was founded by Fred Lutz, CEO, a seasoned founder and COO in startups and scale-ups. Fred started building with AI because he saw it moving the limits on what a small team can do faster than anything in his working life.
We started as Detoil, built to remove the operational toil that eats founders' time. It worked, and it showed us something bigger. The same approach that runs a company's back office can build its software, and can set up a new company properly from day one. The name Detoil described a problem we solve. The name centaur.africa describes what we're for: people made more powerful by the machines they choose to work with.
We're based in Cape Town and work with founders building companies in medical devices, language technology, media and more. We like working with people who are building, or trying to build, interesting things that make the world better.
Who does the work
centaur.africa is a flexible team of seasoned designers, tinkerers, software developers, founders and operators. Our team has senior experience in AI, blockchain, payments, fintech, intelligence, data analysis, e-commerce, app development, analytics, infrastructure and more. Our team functions more like a cooperative than a company, where everyone takes ownership of the deliverable. We bring in the people each project needs, and an experienced person directs and checks every piece of work.