product system
Swifta
A product discovery platform with WhatsApp-based intent capture, built for the Africa's Talking BuildWithAI Pan-African finals — where it placed first against teams from four countries.
Team build — product direction and engineering
Swifta grew out of Hardware-OS. The earlier build indexed a narrow category — iron, ceramics, building materials — and the finals version widened it to general commerce while keeping the part that worked: letting someone describe what they want in their own words over WhatsApp instead of navigating a catalogue.
The idea outlived the competition. It became the thinking behind Twizrr, Codedevs' flagship product.
What this record says
Problem: Buyers know what they need but not what it is called, which makes catalogue search the wrong interface for them.
Audience: Shoppers searching for products across informal and semi-formal African retail.
Contribution: Product direction and engineering as part of the competing team.
Status: Hackathon build. Not maintained as a product; its direction continued into Twizrr.
System decisions
- Capture intent in natural language over WhatsApp rather than through catalogue navigation
- Widen the category scope from the earlier Hardware-OS build while keeping its intent-capture model
Next improvement: None planned — the work carried forward into Twizrr instead.
Evidence and sources
1st place, Africa's Talking BuildWithAI Pan-African finals - Competed against teams from four African countries. The competition repository is not public, so this record has no verifying link. Happy to walk through the build on request.