South African software company
Software built for real‑world problems
We design and build custom software for South African businesses: line‑of‑business systems, web platforms and automation.
ubooks - tax calendar
What the work has actually changed
Outcomes from real projects. We do not name clients, so the sector and the result have to stand on their own.
80%less admin work
A construction operation that stopped running on paperwork
Administrative work fell by around 80% once the operation moved into a single system. Traceability improved with it: job history is on the record, so questions from clients get answered from the system instead of from memory.
Construction & trades5businesses running on UBooks
An accounting and ERP platform we run ourselves
UBooks is our own product, in production, with five businesses keeping their books on it. We carry the consequences of its engineering decisions every month rather than handing them over at go-live - which is the standard we build client finance systems to.
Accounting & financeInverters, solar and batteries reporting to one place
Home automation and IoT integration work across inverter systems, tracking solar generation and battery consumption. The hard part is rarely the dashboard; it is normalising what each device reports so that a single screen can be trusted.
Energy & IoT monitoringDomains worked in: Finance, Commerce, ERP, CRM, IoT, Data, Logistics integrations. The engineering discipline is what carries across, not a specialism in any one of them.
What we build
Eleven disciplines, done properly, rather than a list of everything. Each one is something we run in production, not a capability we would learn on your budget.
Build
New systems, shaped around how the business already runs.
Connect & automate
Data moving between systems without anybody retyping it.
Run & secure
Production kept fast, patched, backed up and hard to break into.
Advise
An independent technical opinion before the money is committed.
Built and run in-house
Software we build and run ourselves
UBooks is a commercial SaaS with paying customers, built and operated by us. We carry the consequences of its engineering decisions every month.
UBooks
Run your whole business from one place
A South African accounting and ERP platform: invoicing, purchases, banking, a real double-entry ledger, payroll on current SARS tax tables, stock, projects and reporting - in one system.
In one system
- Quotes to invoices to payments, VAT-valid
- PAYE, UIF and SDL calculated for you
- Bank statement import with auto-matching
- Trial balance, P&L and balance sheet from the ledger
In development
Two more products, built and tested the same way UBooks is.
- In developmentUniversal dashboard
UDash
Live dashboards over data pulled in from anywhere, with the history kept, so a trend is there to read rather than just the latest value.
- Feeds that sync themselves from web APIs, and over MQTT from plant equipment
- Dashboards you drag and resize, updating live
- Built first for production sites: PLC tags and production lines on one screen
- In developmentProperty management system
ULodge
Property management for lodges and hospitality operators, built for the front desk, the housekeeping trolley and the owner’s office.
- A reservation calendar with every unit and every stay on one chart
- A housekeeping board that shows which rooms are ready
- More than one property under a single account
Running a plant or a lodge?
Ask about early accessDiverse industries, one method
The domain changes; the discipline does not. Pick a sector to see what usually breaks there, and what we build instead.
One system instead of a site WhatsApp group and a spreadsheet
Where it usually breaks
Labour, plant, subcontractors and compliance records spread across site WhatsApp groups, paper job cards and one spreadsheet nobody else can open.
What we build instead
Employee and trade registers, asset and plant tracking, assignment scheduling, document control and per-project cost visibility in one operational system.
- Employee, trade and certification registers
- Asset and plant assignment tracking
- Job cards and site document control
- Project cost and margin reporting
Right every month, not approximately right
Where it usually breaks
A double-entry ledger, VAT-valid invoicing and SARS-compliant payroll that has to be right every month, not approximately right.
What we build instead
UBooks - our own accounting and ERP platform - plus custom reporting, bank-statement automation and integrations into the systems a finance team already uses.
- Double-entry general ledger and trial balance
- PAYE, UIF and SDL on current SARS tax tables
- Bank statement import with automatic matching
- Aged debtors and creditors reporting
Load, generation and state of charge on one screen
Where it usually breaks
Inverters, batteries and meters each produce data in their own format, and nobody can see load, generation and state of charge on one screen in time to act on it.
What we build instead
Telemetry ingestion from inverters and sensors, time-series storage, live dashboards and threshold alerting - including off-grid and time-of-use logic.
- Inverter and battery telemetry ingestion
- Live load, solar and grid dashboards
- Time-of-use and off-grid charging control
- Threshold alerting and historical trends
Time, deliverables and invoices that agree at month end
Where it usually breaks
Billable time, retainers, deliverables and client documents tracked in four tools that do not reconcile at month end.
What we build instead
Client and matter records, time capture, recurring billing, document management and utilisation reporting that agrees with the invoices.
- Client, matter and engagement records
- Time capture and utilisation reporting
- Recurring retainer billing
- Secure client document access
Stock that matches the shelf and margin you can prove
Where it usually breaks
Stock counts drift from the system, trade and retail pricing are maintained by hand, and margin per line is a guess.
What we build instead
Stock control across warehouses, tiered and bulk price lists, purchase-order-to-bill traceability and margin reporting per item.
- Multi-warehouse stock control
- Trade, wholesale and shelf price lists
- Purchase order to bill traceability
- Per-item margin reporting
From dispatch to invoice without a phone call in between
Where it usually breaks
Jobs are dispatched by phone, proof of delivery arrives as a photo in a chat, and the courier system does not talk to the invoicing system.
What we build instead
Dispatch and scheduling, mobile-first job capture, courier and tracking API integration, and automated billing off completed jobs.
- Dispatch and route scheduling
- Mobile job capture and proof of delivery
- Courier and tracking API integration
- Automated billing from completed jobs
Why companies keep us
Not the cheapest quote, and not the biggest team. What you get is engineering you can hand to somebody else without an apology.
Domain-agnostic on purpose
Construction, accounting, energy monitoring, professional services - the domain changes, the discipline does not. We learn the business before we model it, which is why the range is a strength rather than a lack of focus.
We build products, not just projects
Running UBooks in production means we carry the cost of every shortcut: migrations, support load, upgrade paths, tax-table changes. That experience goes into client work whether or not anybody asks for it.
Built to be handed over
Clean architecture, documented decisions, automated deployment and code you own outright. The measure of a good handover is that the next developer does not need us.
Measured, not asserted
Performance budgets, Lighthouse scores, health-gated releases with automatic rollback. "It feels fast" is not a result - a number on a throttled mid-range phone is.
How a project actually runs
No black box. You know what happens next, roughly what it costs, and what you walk away with at each stage.
1-2 weeks
Discovery
We map the actual process - including the parts that happen in WhatsApp and on paper - and write down the scope, the constraints and what success looks like. You get that document whether or not you continue with us.
1 week
Architecture & plan
Domain model, integration map, hosting decision and a delivery plan with estimates. Trade-offs are stated explicitly, in writing, before anybody writes code.
6-12 weeks to first release
Build in increments
Short cycles with something reviewable at the end of each one. Automated tests and a deployment pipeline exist from the first week, not bolted on at the end.
Ongoing
Release & harden
Health-gated deployment with automatic rollback, monitoring and alerting, restore-tested backups, and a runbook for the incidents that are actually likely.
Your call
Support or hand over
Keep us on a support agreement, or take the documented codebase to your own team. Both are fine, and we do not make the second one difficult.
Questions people actually ask
The short version. There are more on the FAQ page.
What does UnknownDev do?
UnknownDev is a South African software company. We build custom software and web applications, set up cloud hosting and deployment pipelines, automate manual business processes, integrate systems that do not talk to each other, and provide independent technical consulting. We also develop our own SaaS products, including the UBooks accounting and ERP platform.
Where are you based, and do you work remotely?
We are based in South Africa and work remotely with clients across the country and internationally. Where data residency, latency or cost matters, we can host on South African infrastructure rather than a distant cloud region.
What size of business do you work with?
Mostly small and medium South African businesses, and teams inside larger organisations who need a specific system built properly. If a project is genuinely better served by an off-the-shelf product, we will tell you that instead of quoting for it.
What industries do you work in?
Construction and trades, accounting and finance, energy and IoT monitoring, professional services, retail and wholesale, and logistics and field operations. We are deliberately domain-agnostic - the method transfers, so we learn the business properly before modelling it.
Who owns the code you write?
You do. Ownership of the software we build for you transfers to you and lives in a repository you control, with documentation and an automated deployment pipeline. There is no licence that expires if you stop working with us.
How much does a project cost?
It depends on scope, but we do not quote blind. A short discovery phase produces a written scope and an estimate before any build commitment, and you keep that document regardless of whether you proceed.
Still wondering about something?
Read the full FAQGot a problem that does not fit a product?
Tell us what you are trying to solve. You will get a straight answer: a suggested next step, or an honest note that we are not the right fit.
A reply from a developer. Not a sales pipeline. The person who reads your message is the person who would do the work.
An honest answer on fit. If an off-the-shelf product solves your problem better than a custom build, we will tell you which one.
No obligation. A first conversation costs nothing and commits you to nothing. Discovery output is yours either way.