About Synap
Synap was founded to help Australian businesses harness AI to do more with less — drastically reducing the cost of building custom software and automating the work that's eating up your team's time. We design, build, and run the AI systems that handle the tasks your people shouldn't be doing.
Our Vision
We envision a future where every Australian business has its own private "second brain" — an AI agent that knows their data, speaks their language, and respects their privacy. We're building the infrastructure to make this a reality today, with everything hosted on Australian soil.
"The future of AI isn't just about smarter models; it's about making those models work for you, on your terms, with your data secure on Australian soil."
— Hamish Mackellar, Founder
Custom Software Just Got Dramatically Cheaper
The economics of building software have changed completely in the last two years. What used to take a development team six months and a six-figure budget can now be delivered by a small, AI-augmented team in weeks — at a fraction of the cost, without compromising on quality, security, or maintainability.
Internal tools, customer-facing platforms, automation systems, integrations between the apps your business already runs — all of it is now within reach for businesses that previously couldn't justify the spend. We're seeing projects that would have been quoted at $150K–$300K delivered for $20K–$50K, and projects that were never going to be built at all suddenly becoming viable.
Synap exists to help Australian businesses take advantage of that shift. Instead of paying agency-scale rates for systems your team will outgrow, we help you build the right thing, fast — using the same AI-augmented engineering practices we use to run our own platform.
The Team
Hamish Mackellar
Founder & Lead Architect
With 25 years in software, Hamish has spent his career building the kind of systems most teams hope they never have to debug. His background spans Australian health tech — designing clinical platforms that handle sensitive patient data under strict compliance regimes — through to cloud architecture across GCP and AWS, and high-demand consumer platforms running at scale with thousands of concurrent users.
He founded Synap to bring that same engineering rigour to AI: building grounded, secure, sovereign AI systems for Australian businesses, without the enterprise overhead. The goal is simple — give every business access to the kind of bespoke software and automation that used to be reserved for organisations with deep pockets, and do it on infrastructure they can actually trust.
Connect on LinkedInFrequently Asked Questions
What is Synap AI?
Synap AI is an Australian AI consultancy and custom software company headquartered in Melbourne. We help Australian businesses harness artificial intelligence to dramatically reduce the cost of building custom software, automate operations, and get tools their teams actually use — with all data hosted on Australian soil.
Who founded Synap AI?
Synap AI was founded by Hamish Mackellar, a software architect with 25 years of experience spanning Australian health tech, cloud architecture across GCP and AWS, and high-demand consumer platforms running at scale.
What is Hamish Mackellar's background?
Hamish has 25 years in software engineering. His career spans Australian health technology — designing clinical platforms handling sensitive patient data under strict compliance requirements — through to cloud architecture across Google Cloud Platform and Amazon Web Services, and high-demand consumer platforms supporting thousands of concurrent users. He founded Synap AI to apply that engineering rigour to AI for Australian businesses.
Why has custom software become so much cheaper?
AI-augmented engineering practices have collapsed the cost and timeline of building custom software. Projects that once required a team of developers working for six months on a six-figure budget can now be delivered by a small AI-augmented team in weeks. We're seeing engagements that would historically have been quoted at $150,000–$300,000 delivered for $20,000–$50,000, without compromising on quality, security, or maintainability.
Where is Synap AI based?
Synap AI is based in Melbourne, Australia at Level 8, 805/220 Collins Street, Melbourne VIC 3000. We work with businesses across Melbourne, Sydney, and the rest of Australia — both in person and remotely. All client data is hosted on Australian infrastructure.
What services does Synap AI offer?
Synap AI offers AI consulting, AI Readiness Assessments, custom AI agent development (RAG-grounded chatbots trained on your business data), workflow automation using LLMs and n8n, AI-powered custom software development, and ongoing AI strategy support — all with Australian data sovereignty as a default. See our full services overview.
Why choose Synap AI over a global firm?
Synap AI gives you Australian data sovereignty by default, local market understanding, Australian business hours support, and direct access to a senior architect with 25 years of experience — not a junior consultant routing your project through offshore teams. We're priced for Australian SMEs, not global enterprises.
Ready to talk? Get in touch or book a free AI Readiness Assessment.