# Ayoub Jouini

> Ayoub Jouini is a serial founder and product lead. He runs Hortensia, a software studio, leads product across its ventures and advises founders on strategy, scope and builds.

Ayoub Jouini is a serial founder and product lead. He started Hortensia, a software studio, in 2020 (registered 2021) and grew it from 3 to 30-40 people. He has freelanced since high school and left engineering school to keep working. Client work funds products the studio owns. He works with founders as an advisor and through Hortensia.

## By the numbers (from the Hortensia GitHub organisation)
- Running Hortensia since 2020
- 73 codebases, 22,908 commits on main branches
- Shipped code on 342 of the last 365 days
- 9 products owned, clients in 11 countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, United Kingdom, United States, Canada, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Australia)

## Ventures
- Hortensia (Founder, Since 2020): The software studio. Client work pays for our own products. https://hortensia-agency.com
- Sparkia (Studio product, Live): A workspace where brands plan, generate, approve, publish and reply to social content with AI. https://sparkia.io
- Stellify (My startup, Live alpha): Music discovery where fans stream, build playlists and vote on artist rankings. https://usestellify.com
- Driva (My startup, Live): Delivery operations for a last-mile courier, with a cash-on-delivery ledger that balances to the dinar. https://driva.hortensia-agency.com
- Sprint (Studio product, In daily use): The operations platform the whole studio runs on.
- Kollabo (Studio product, Building): A marketplace where brands and creators sign a contract and pay through escrow.
- GlowIt (Studio product, Live): Booking for beauty salons and home beauty services, with a back office for every salon. https://glowit.tn
- Project Curve (Co-founder, Not live): WBS and S-curve project planning. A company I co-founded.
- Vectorit (Internal tool, Internal): Turns any image into an SVG that matches it pixel for pixel.

## Consulting
- Strategy call (One session, 60 to 90 minutes): Pricing, scope, build or buy, the next hire, or why the project keeps slipping. One problem, worked through properly.
- Product audit (Fixed scope, written report): A review of your product, roadmap and codebase before you commit: what to keep, what to cut, and where the risk sits.
- Fractional product lead (Part-time, month to month): I run product for you a few days a month: roadmap, scope, the team's priorities and the decisions nobody else wants to make.
- Build with Hortensia (Fixed price, fixed result): The studio designs and builds your product at a fixed price. We carry the risk of our own estimate.
Book a call: https://ayoubjouini.com/contact

## FAQ
- What is Hortensia? A software studio I started in 2020 and registered in 2021. We build apps, platforms and ERPs for clients, and put the margin into products we own, like Sparkia, Stellify and Driva.
- What does a product lead actually do here? Decide what gets built, in what order, and what gets cut. Across our own ventures that means roadmaps, scope and the trade-offs between them. For clients it means the same thing, on their product.
- Do you work with founders outside Tunisia? Yes. The team works across countries, and we have built for clients in eleven countries across Europe, North America, the Gulf and Australia.
- How do you price? By the result, not the hour. Builds are fixed price and we carry the risk of our own estimate. Advisory work is scoped on the first call.
- Do you ever take equity? Sometimes, in place of part of the fee, when we believe in the product and the founders. It is a conversation, not a default.
- Do you still write code? Yes. Less than before, but enough that my opinions about scope and estimates come from doing the work.
- What happens after I book a call? You tell me what you are building and where it is stuck. I reply personally, with questions or a straight no if I am not the right person.

## Pages
- About: https://ayoubjouini.com/about
- Ventures: https://ayoubjouini.com/ventures
- Consulting: https://ayoubjouini.com/consulting
- Writing: https://ayoubjouini.com/writing (RSS: https://ayoubjouini.com/feed.xml)
- Books: https://ayoubjouini.com/books
- Contact: hello@ayoubjouini.com