The studio / Addis Ababa
A small studio with a long attention span.
Six experienced people. We take on fewer projects than we could, because the work is software that people depend on every day.
Why we exist
Too many good companies were sold software they could not maintain. We built the studio we wished they had hired.
EthioDevMatrix began in 2019 with a delivery project nobody else wanted. The brief was three spreadsheets and a promise. We spent two weeks in the delivery office before writing a line of code. That habit stuck.
Today we are six people in Addis Ababa, working with teams across East Africa and the Gulf. We design, build, and hand over software for teams that cannot afford to stop. The work is rarely glamorous. It is delivery boards, clinic schedules, payment records, and field apps that work on one bar of signal.
We are not the biggest studio in the region. We are the one that stays for the launch, writes the handover guide, and answers the phone in month seven.
How we think
Four rules we do not bend.
These are not wall posters. They are the reasons a project either works or gets uncomfortable in the first month.
Watch the work first
The person doing the task knows more about it than the brief does. We start there, not in a design file.
Write it down
The plan, decisions, and trade-offs live in a document. If it is not written, it did not happen.
Use what is proven
New technology is exciting, but it should not be the reason your system breaks. We save invention for the parts that need it.
Stay for the launch
Software is not finished when it launches. It is finished when your team can run it without us.
A short history
Seven years, one habit.
We grew by staying. Most of our work comes from a client who saw a system survive its first year and told someone else.
Founded in Addis Ababa
First project: a delivery board for a 12 vehicle fleet. The client still runs it.
First payments project
A payment and reporting tool for a finance team. The team grows to four.
Phone apps
First app that works without internet, built for agents working outside network coverage.
Automation work
Reading documents and checking payments, always with a person reviewing the result.
30 projects, four countries
Six experienced people, a studio in Addis Ababa, and clients who call back.
The people
You will know everyone on the build.
There is no account manager between you and the work. The people in the kickoff are the people writing the code and drawing the screens.
Sofonias Hagos
Founder / lead engineer
Hana Girma
Product design lead
Dawit Alemu
Software engineer
Meron Tesfaye
Mobile engineer
Yonas Bekele
Hosting and security
Selam Tadesse
Project lead
Work with us
We hire slowly.
If you have built software people rely on and you like the unglamorous parts, send a short note with one thing you built and one thing you would do differently. No long cover letter.
Write to the studioNext step
Meet the people who will build it.
One call, a few questions, and an honest answer about whether we are the right studio for the work.