I am absolutely delighted with the software work delivered by Eru at Identity Software. From start to finish, Eru demonstrated exceptional technical skill, clear communication, and a genuinely professional approach that made the entire project smooth and rewarding.
Eru took the time to understand my requirements in depth and provided thoughtful guidance throughout the process. His expertise in custom software, APIs, integrations, and secure system architecture was evident at every stage, and he consistently delivered high-quality work that exceeded expectations.
What really stood out was the balanced blend of deep technical knowledge and practical execution — ensuring not just a working solution, but one that was reliable, maintainable, and thoughtfully designed. I also greatly appreciated the responsive communication and the way questions or updates were handled promptly and transparently.
I confidently recommend Identity Software to individuals, small businesses, and large organisations alike who are looking for a skilled, dependable, and professional developer for custom software projects. I will happily work with Eru again in the future.
Custom software · Made in Australia
You can’t scale chaos.
Paper job sheets. Spreadsheets only one person understands. Customers ringing to chase orders. We build the operational backbone that lets an ambitious business grow without the wheels coming off.
Engineers from
Automattic
ThoughtWorks
Block · Cash App
The problem
It works. Right up until you try to grow.
Staff make mistakes
The same errors, again and again. Because the process lives in people’s heads and on paper.
Customers chase you
Ringing to check where their order is. Every call costs time and a bit of reputation.
The office is chaos
Orders lost, statuses unknown, everything urgent, nothing visible.
You’re flying blind
No clear view of which customers make you money, and which quietly cost you.
A business assembled out of parts needs one system to run on.
What we do
We replace the paper with one system.
The operational backbone
Software built around how your business actually works.
Not a product you bend your business around. Not another subscription that does 60% of the job. One system, made to fit.
One system, end to end
Orders, jobs, production status in one place. Everyone sees the same truth. Nothing gets lost between the desk and the floor.
Everything visible
Where every job is, right now, without asking anyone. Customers stop ringing because they already know.
Know your numbers
Which jobs made money and which ones lost it. Real margins per customer, per product, per run. Not a guess at the end of the quarter.
AI, done properly
Everyone wants AI. Few get it working.
Most “add AI to your business” projects fail because they bolt a chatbot onto a mess. AI works when it sits on a clean system with good data underneath it, which is exactly what we build first.
AI that knows your business
We connect models to your own documents, policies and data using retrieval (RAG), so answers are grounded in your reality rather than the internet’s guesses.
Automating the tedious
Data entry, triage, summarising, checking one document against another. The repetitive work that eats your team’s week, handled quietly in the background.
Built to be trusted
The hard part isn’t the demo. It’s making AI reliable, safe and auditable enough to run a real business on. That’s the part we’ve actually shipped.
Our team has built AI and data systems where reliability isn’t optional, including fraud and risk ML at Block / Cash App, and a RAG platform analysing risk-governance policies for the mining industry. We know the difference between an AI demo and AI you can depend on.
Live · continuing development
Crownpack: taking a factory off paper.
Crownpack manufactures plastic packaging. Joe, the CEO, brought investors together to acquire Crownpack, then acquired a second manufacturer and merged them.
The problem: production ran on paper job sheets. Mistakes, chaos in the office, customers on the phone asking where their order was. And no view of which customers were actually profitable. He needed a system to match the complexity of his growing business.
Working closely with Joe and his team, we developed a system that links pricing, orders, production, and invoicing into one unified business operating system.
Every job is tracked in real time on the production board and mobile devices. Orders are validated against pricing and production rules, reducing common mistakes. Joe and his investors can connect their AI assistants to ask questions against a real-time view of the business.
Joe can focus on growing the business rather than chasing paperwork.
“Why did we build rather than buy? Because nothing off the shelf runs a factory the way we run ours.”
— Joe, CEO, Crownpack
More of our work
Software we’ve shipped.
-
Reporto, the Allied Health Reporting Assistant.
When a child needs to get assistive technology such as a wheelchair on the NDIS, their therapist must complete a…
-
Kebudel, the platform for Early Childhood Educators.
Kebudel provides a simplified approach to planning for learning, communicating with families and team collaboration. Founded by current and former…
-
Method Race Wheels Fitment Search
Results: Increased sales. Reduced refunds. Time saved. The brand has now gone international!
What clients say
Reviewed on Google.
from 6 Google reviews
Eru and Identity Software stepped in to fix and improve the connection between our CRM and ATS and our website, and there were some complex requirements to work with. He quickly identified the issues, devised an efficient solution and everything works wonderfully now.
Eru worked quickly, to budget, and the outcome is better than we thought we'd ever get. And he's truly great to work with.
Can not possibly recommend Eru and Identity Software enough.
Engaged to build a handful PHP Api connectors between our primary software and Make.com. After a doing due diligence, he identified a better solution and built one to connect them all.
Delivered lightning fast, on budget and well above expected functionality.Eru may just be a Jedi… maybe even the one.
We use Identity Software regularly for custom development of our platform. Eru is excellent at listening to what we want and finding the solutions that will work best for what we are trying to achieve. I highly recommend Eru for custom development work.
Eru has been incredibly helpful in the development of our WordPress site. We have had some complex requirements. While helping us navigate these, Eru has been responsive, innovative and thorough. Highly recommend.
Why us
You work directly with the engineers building your software.
Most agencies sell you a star team, then swap in whoever’s free. You pay full price either way and never meet the people building your business.
We’re the opposite. A small, senior team who’ve shipped real systems at Automattic, ThoughtWorks and Block, at a scale most agencies only talk about. The people on the call are the people doing the work.
And we’re fast. Modern AI tooling lets us build in a fraction of the time this used to take, which is what makes proper custom software worth it for a business your size.
- Senior engineers who’ve shipped at real scale.
- We work on site, with the people who’ll use it every day.
- Real rigour on security, performance and quality. Built to last.
- Training in person, and local support long after go-live.
- You own everything. We stay on because you want us to.
How we work
We don’t hand it over and disappear.
A system only pays for itself when your staff actually use it. So most of our work happens in your workplace, alongside the people who’ll be living in it every day, and it carries on well after the software goes live.
1. We start on your floor
Before we write any code we spend time where the work happens. We’ll talk to you, but also to whoever is packing the orders, because they know where the process really falls over. You’ll see working software within weeks, and your staff shape it while changes are still cheap.
2. We train your staff in person
On site, on your real jobs, in the words your team already uses. We’ll also make sure someone in your business can train the next new starter without having to ring us.
3. We’re still here afterwards
The same engineers who built it, a phone call away, for as long as you find it useful. You own the code outright, so staying with us is a choice you keep making rather than a contract you’re stuck in.
Owning a piece of software was never really the point. Six months on, the job should be easier, and nobody should want to go back to the old way of doing it.
The team
Small team. Serious craft.
Two senior engineers with more than thirty years of building software between them. No account managers, no hand-offs to a junior team.
Eru Penkman
Founder · Software Engineer
13 years building software, including at Automattic (WordPress.com) and ThoughtWorks. Leads every build and stays hands-on from first call to launch.
Automattic
ThoughtWorks
13+ yrs
Johan Zietsman
Data & Infrastructure Engineer
20+ years in software. Builds and operates large-scale data pipelines at Block / Cash App, systems processing billions of events a day to power fraud and risk ML. Cares about reliability and systems you can reason about.
Block · Cash App
ThoughtWorks
20+ yrs
Proper engineering, without the agency layers in between.
Where to start
Two ways in.
Whether you’re running a business that’s outgrown its process, or proving an idea that doesn’t exist yet.
Most clients
Custom business software
For established businesses that have outgrown paper, spreadsheets and off-the-shelf tools. We build the system your business actually runs on.
from $51k
Typically 3–6 months · scoped and staged
- Built around your real process, not a template
- Staged delivery, so value arrives early
- Direct access to the engineers building it
- Training on site, and support once it’s running
- Yours to own, outright
Earlier stage
The Proof of Concept
For founders with an idea that lives or dies on one hard technical question. In six weeks we build the software that proves it.
from $12,750
Two 3-week sprints · $25,500 for both
- Working demo of the hardest part
- Costed plan for the full build
- Fixed price, fixed timeline
Questions
What owners ask first.
Why build custom instead of buying off the shelf?
If a product fits your business, buy it, and we’ll tell you so. But most growing businesses end up bending their process around software that nearly fits, then patching the gap with spreadsheets and phone calls. Custom software fits the way you already work, and it’s yours.
Isn’t custom software slow and expensive?
It used to be. Senior engineers with modern AI tooling work far faster than was possible even two years ago. That’s precisely why custom is now worth it for a $3–20M business, not just an enterprise.
What do I own at the end?
Everything. The code, the system, the data. No lock-in, no per-seat licensing, no hostage situation.
How do you avoid the six-figure disaster I’ve heard about?
Staged delivery and a fixed scope per stage. You see working software early and often, and you decide whether to keep going at each step. You’re never handing over a cheque and waiting nine months.
I’ve already built a prototype with AI. Can you take it further?
Often, yes, and it’s a great starting point. Tools like Lovable, v0 and Cursor are brilliant for proving an idea quickly. But they tend to hit a wall: the code gets fragile, security and data handling are an afterthought, and it becomes hard to extend without things breaking. We’ll take an honest look at what you’ve built. Sometimes we can build on it; sometimes the fastest path is to keep the idea and rebuild the foundation properly. Either way, the thinking you’ve already done isn’t wasted.
Can you add AI to my business?
Yes, but we’ll be honest about where it actually helps. AI only works when the data underneath it is in order, so sometimes the right first step is getting that foundation in place. When AI does fit, we’ve shipped the reliable, auditable kind rather than just a demo. Bring the problem you’re trying to solve and we’ll tell you straight whether AI is the answer.
Where are you based, and do you travel?
We’re based on the Sunshine Coast and in Brisbane, and we come to you: sitting in your office, walking your factory floor, working alongside your staff. For the right project we’ll fly interstate too. Being there in person matters more than people expect, because the way a business really runs is rarely the way it looks on a process diagram. It’s also why we’re still around after launch, to train your staff and pick up the phone when something needs changing.
Free · 45 minutes · no obligation
Book a Vision Session.
Bring the chaos, the idea, or the half-built prototype. In 45 minutes we’ll map what your software could do, whether AI has a place in it, and roughly what it would take to build. You leave with a clear picture, whether or not you work with us.
0424 523 910 · eru@identitysoftware.com.au · Sunshine Coast & Brisbane · across Australia