Hamilton, Ontario
Custom software development in Hamilton, Ontario
JW Soft is an independent product studio based in Hamilton, building custom web and mobile software for organizations whose workflows have outgrown the tools available to them.
An independent studio, not an agency
You will not be handed to an account manager. JW Soft is run by one engineer — Peter Basl, who holds a PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering, teaches at Mohawk College and McMaster University, and builds, launches, and operates every product in the portfolio. The person who runs the first conversation is the person who writes the code and the person who answers when something breaks after launch.
That structure has a specific consequence: nothing gets lost in translation between the discovery conversation and the build, because there is no handoff.
What we build
- Custom web applications for processes currently held together by spreadsheets, forms, and email
- Cross-platform mobile products for work that happens away from a desk
- Rapid prototypes and MVPs to make an idea tangible before a large commitment
- Applied AI features inside existing products — summarization, classification, search, recommendation, and automation, with human decisions kept human
- Improvements to software you already have when the workflow, usability, or automation needs attention
Working locally, and beyond
Hamilton and the surrounding Golden Horseshoe — Burlington, Oakville, Stoney Creek, Ancaster, Dundas, Grimsby, and the wider Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area — are the natural catchment for in-person discovery sessions, which are genuinely useful early on. Being able to watch the work happen where it happens surfaces edge cases that never come up in a call.
That said, most of the portfolio was built with distributed collaborators, and remote engagements across Canada and the United States work well. Proximity helps at the start; it is not a requirement.
Who this tends to suit
- Small and mid-sized organizations running a critical process on tools that were never designed for it
- Operators and domain experts who know exactly what is wrong but not what to build
- Founders who want a focused, tested prototype before committing to a larger investment
- Teams with a working internal tool that has stopped keeping up
Sectors we have shipped into
Education technology, sports and event operations, small-business financial operations, health and fitness, and consumer wellbeing. The domains differ; the pattern does not. Start with a real workflow, make the decisions visible, and build the smallest product that changes the work.
Describe the workflow. We will figure out the product together.
You do not need a specification, a budget range, or a technology preference. A paragraph about the task that keeps getting in the way is enough.