Kaizen Forge

Software engineering · Vitória, Brazil · serving globally

Talk to someone who's done it. cut the hype Software that holds up in production.

Talk to someone who's done it.
Software that holds up in production.

We solve the engineering problem holding your business back: a product from scratch, a critical system that cannot go down, an integration nobody can close, or the project nobody wants to touch anymore. Built to the bar of Nike, fintech and US healthtech.

Book a free assessmentSee measured results

Numbers measured in production, not on slides

  • 16M+assets in production at NikeAsset Library · visual pipeline automation
  • US$ 55M+processed by the payments system I lead8M+ transactions processed · 5,000+ merchants
  • 6 monthsfrom zero to five-figure MRR at Topo Contábilour own accounting SaaS, in production
  • 800+municipalities served by a GovTech platform we help evolveGrupo EL ecosystem · via koy.haus, our studio

What we forge

Three fronts, one standard: production

Software Engineering

A senior squad, ready

Five engineers led by me. Products from scratch, critical integrations, payments and systems that cannot go down. The same quality bar as Nike and fintech.

Meet the squad

AI Consulting

AI in your company, for real

An assessment of your processes, a roadmap prioritized by return, and agents and automations that actually reach production, in any industry. Your team leaves trained to operate and evolve everything.

How it works

Career Coaching

From Brazil to the world

1:1 calls, resume reviews and strategy for developers aiming at senior and international roles. The path I took, from Vitória to Nike and US healthtech, mapped for you.

See formats

The method

Kaizen: continuous, measured improvement

“A thousand days of training to develop, ten thousand days of training to polish.”

Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
  1. 01

    Assess

    We map your process and the system you already have to find where engineering generates real return, and where a simple fix solves it cheaper. No selling a project where none is needed.

  2. 02

    Cut

    A roadmap prioritized by return. We cut what doesn't matter and attack first what pays for the project.

  3. 03

    Forge

    Production deployment: the system, the integrations, the tests and the observability. With metrics from day one, cost, quality, speed.

  4. 04

    Polish

    Continuous improvement on top of the metrics: performance, running cost and reliability. We measure before and after, always.

Results

Where the forge has been

See all results

Nike

Global marketing

GenAI eliminating manual creative work at global scale

I built AutoCrop, a GenAI service that generates image crops optimized per media format, and AutoLayout, automated marketing asset generation with correct typography, integrated with Figma, on top of a library of 16M+ digital assets.

  • 16M+ digital assets under management
  • AI-generated crops and layouts, no manual work
  • Event-driven AWS architecture at global scale

Healthtech (US)

Healthcare · HIPAA

AI agents in telehealth at significantly lower cost

As tech lead of a regulated (HIPAA) telehealth vertical, I lead a production AI agent stack, agent orchestration, MCP skills and Bedrock. With metrics, caching, prompt engineering and deterministic scripts, AI cost per operation dropped significantly.

  • Significant, measured reduction in AI cost per operation
  • Agents in production in a regulated domain (HIPAA)
  • Metrics-driven continuous improvement, kaizen applied

Yooga

Fintech · Restaurants

US$ 55M+ transacted and a team accelerated by AI

I lead the payments team of a system used by thousands of restaurants: instant payments (PIX), Apple Pay, anti-fraud, automated settlement. I introduced AI into the whole team's development workflow, more delivery without giving up architecture and tests.

  • US$ 55M+ in transacted volume
  • 8M+ transactions processed with idempotent flows
  • A 5-dev team on an AI-first workflow

Partners

Companies that trusted our engineering

JAPERE

The squad

The team behind the code

Senior engineers who have built with me before, from Nike to fintech to products from scratch. A lean team, AI-first culture, no management layers between you and the people writing the code.

  • Kayo Souza

    Kayo Souza

    Tech Lead · AI & Payments

    8+ years building production systems. GenAI at Nike, AI agents in US healthtech (HIPAA), and the payments team that has transacted US$ 55M+ at Yooga.

    LinkedInGitHub
    TypeScriptAIPayments
  • João Holz

    João Holz

    Software Engineer · Full-stack

    Full-stack engineer with experience in product, backend architecture and legacy-system integration. Delivers from discovery to production.

    LinkedIn
    TypeScriptNode.js
  • Eden Kiefer Junior

    Eden Kiefer Junior

    Software Engineer · Backend

    Focused on back-end and corporate integrations. Works on complex data flows and automation.

    LinkedIn
    Node.jsIntegrations
  • Lucas Fabris

    Lucas Fabris

    Full-Stack Engineer

    Delivers from backend to frontend. Focused on product, performance and developer experience.

    LinkedInGitHub
    TypeScriptReact

The founder

Kayo Souza (Kinho)

Tech lead · Applied AI & payments

8+ years building production systems: GenAI at Nike, AI agents in US healthtech (HIPAA), and the payments team that has transacted US$ 55M+ at Yooga. Top 0.01% of Claude users worldwide. Leading Kaizen Forge | and a partner at the koy.haus and Haus studios, where the cases above are born.

My storyLinkedIn

Ready to cut the hype?

A free 30-minute assessment. You'll leave knowing where engineering generates return in your company, decide based on evidence, not opinion.

Book a free assessment