Build an Internal AI Tool Your Team Actually Uses
The first step to integrate AI is to identify one high-volume, repetitive internal process. The second is to map the existing manual workflow into a precise sequence of inputs and outputs.
Syntora helps small to medium businesses identify high-volume, repetitive internal processes for AI automation. We design and build custom systems, such as document analysis or support ticket summarization tools, using scalable serverless architectures and large language models like Claude API.
An effective internal AI tool solves one specific, recurring problem. This is not about company-wide transformation; it is about automating a single workflow that consumes hours every week. The project scope is defined by the data sources it needs to connect to and the complexity of the decisions it needs to make.
Syntora designs and builds custom AI-powered automation for such workflows. We've built document processing pipelines using Claude API for financial documents, and the same patterns apply to various industry documents requiring summarization or analysis. Our approach focuses on understanding your specific problem and engineering a solution that fits your operational needs.
What Problem Does This Solve?
Many SMBs start by trying to use public versions of ChatGPT for business tasks. An employee will copy-paste customer support tickets or sales emails into the chat window to get summaries or draft replies. This approach fails because it is not secure, requires constant manual effort, and has no memory of your business context or previous interactions.
A common next step is hiring a freelance developer to write a script. They often deliver a Python script in a Jupyter Notebook that works on their machine. But this is not a production system. It has no user interface for your team, no API to connect to your other tools, and no error handling. When an input format changes or an API key expires, the script crashes silently.
Consider a 15-person e-commerce company trying to categorize 2,000 support tickets a month from Intercom. The manual copy-paste into ChatGPT takes one person 10 hours a week. A freelancer's script they bought for a one-time fee fails on any ticket containing an emoji or an attachment, processing only 60% of the volume before it needs to be manually restarted.
How Would Syntora Approach This?
Syntora would begin by auditing your current workflow and connecting to your source systems. For an initiative like a support ticket analyzer, we would use official API clients, such as the Intercom Python SDK, to pull historical conversation data. This data would be staged in a Supabase Postgres database, providing a clean, structured dataset for analysis.
The core of the system would be a FastAPI service containing the business logic. This service would expose an endpoint to accept data, format it into a specific prompt for the Claude 3 Sonnet API, and parse the structured JSON response. We would use Pydantic for strict data validation, ensuring that malformed data is logged and handled gracefully.
This FastAPI service would be containerized using Docker and deployed as a serverless function on AWS Lambda. This architecture incurs no cost when idle and scales automatically to handle traffic spikes. An Amazon API Gateway would provide a secure REST endpoint with API key authentication.
Syntora can develop a simple front-end dashboard on Vercel, allowing your team to log in with their Google accounts via Supabase Auth. This dashboard would provide role-based access control, allowing team members to submit single items or upload a CSV for batch processing. Results would be displayed in a filterable table and could be exported. Total monthly infrastructure costs for such a system are typically under $40.
A typical build timeline for a system of this complexity, from discovery to deployment, would range from 6 to 10 weeks. Your team would need to provide access to relevant source systems and participate in regular feedback sessions. Deliverables would include the deployed system, source code, and documentation.
What Are the Key Benefits?
Production-Ready in 4 Weeks
From our initial discovery call to your team using the live system takes 20 business days. We scope tightly to a single workflow to ensure a fast, successful deployment.
No Per-Seat SaaS Fees
This is a one-time build engagement, not a recurring subscription. After launch, you only pay for the raw AWS and Claude API usage, which is often less than $50 a month.
You Get the Full Source Code
We transfer the complete GitHub repository to you at the end of the project. You own the code and can have any developer extend or maintain it.
Monitored for Failure 24/7
The system includes structured logging with structlog and automated CloudWatch alarms. If API response times spike or error rates exceed 2%, an alert is sent immediately.
Connects to Your Live Data
We build direct integrations to your existing systems like HubSpot, Intercom, or Google Sheets. The tool works with your data in real time, not on stale exports.
What Does the Process Look Like?
Workflow Mapping (Week 1)
You provide read-only access to source systems. We analyze the existing manual process and deliver a technical workflow diagram and a fixed-scope proposal.
Core System Build (Weeks 2-3)
We build the back-end service, API, and data connections. You receive a secure staging URL to test the core logic and provide feedback.
Deployment & UI (Week 4)
We deploy the system to production on AWS and build the Vercel dashboard. You receive login credentials and a one-hour team training session.
Monitoring & Handoff (Weeks 5-8)
We monitor performance and accuracy for 30 days post-launch. You receive the full source code and a runbook detailing system architecture and maintenance.
Frequently Asked Questions
- How much does a custom internal tool cost?
- Pricing is based on a fixed project scope. The primary factors are the number of data sources we need to integrate with, the complexity of the user interface, and the quality of your existing data. We determine a fixed price after the initial workflow mapping session. Book a discovery call at cal.com/syntora/discover to discuss your specific process.
- What happens if the Claude API is down?
- The system is built for resilience. API calls to Claude have automatic retry logic with exponential backoff. If a request fails after three retries, the job is saved to a queue in the Supabase database and an alert is sent. A background process attempts to re-run failed jobs every hour once the API is restored.
- How is this different from hiring a freelancer on Upwork?
- Freelancers often deliver scripts. Syntora delivers production systems. That means we include authentication, logging, automated error monitoring, a user interface with access control, and a deployment pipeline. You get a maintainable asset, not just a piece of code that runs on one person's laptop. The person you talk to on the discovery call is the engineer who writes every line of code.
- How is my internal data kept private?
- The entire system is deployed on your own infrastructure or a dedicated AWS sub-account we manage for you. Your data is never processed on or stored by Syntora's servers. API calls to Claude are made through AWS Bedrock, which contractually agrees not to train its models on your data. You maintain full data sovereignty.
- Is my 10-person company too small for this?
- The right fit is determined by the process, not your headcount. A 10-person company with a manual task that consumes 20+ hours per week sees massive ROI. In contrast, a 50-person company with no single, high-volume repetitive task is not a good fit. We focus on automating specific workflows where the return on investment is clear and measurable.
- What happens after the 8-week handoff period?
- The system is designed to run with minimal intervention. For most clients, the runbook is sufficient for their needs. For teams that want ongoing support, we offer an optional monthly retainer. This covers a set number of hours for monitoring, dependency updates, and minor feature requests. We do not require a long-term support contract.
Ready to Automate Your Technology Operations?
Book a call to discuss how we can implement ai automation for your technology business.
Book a Call