Custom operational software for manufacturers Binghamton, NY

You're a manufacturer with a spreadsheet that runs operations.

It might track delivery dates, production schedules, inventory, or the next step in a job. Your team depends on it. Keeping it up to date is inefficent.

contextFound transforms those load-bearing spreadsheets into tools built around your workflow.

Book a 20-minute conversation

Tell me about one process. Afterward, I'll send you a short brief of what a dedicated solution looks like, with or without us implementing it.

A production spreadsheet listing work orders, operations, hours, and start dates — Product screens, shown with demonstration data.

The Operations Delivery Tracker showing one order with its remaining work, current operation, and projected delivery date — Product screens, shown with demonstration data.

01 The pattern

It started as a practical solution.

Someone just needed a way to get their work done.

You might even have an ERP system, but this spreadsheet has become the record of authority for some portion of your operations.

Over time, updates and imports become manual. Versions get out of sync between team members (or worse, lost). Standard values aren't enforced, breaking formulas. A whole palette of color coded meaning creeps in ("is it red or dark red important?")

Unofficial record of authority.
Status and Visibility.
Gathering input from the team.

Usually there's a keeper of the spreadsheet. When they're out, things get messy.

02 The answer

What answers would increase revenue?

Which orders are at risk this week?
What are we past due on?
What is line-stopping for our customer?
Which deliveries drive new business?

A tool built for the workflow can bring the relevant information together, apply the rules your team uses, and surface only what needs attention.

Tools should be built for the people doing the work. In the process you already have.

03 Product example

Here's one example: getting from order data to a delivery plan.

You have a hot order. It may be behind. The customer starts asking...

"Where are my parts?"

A proper tool brings order information, remaining operations, and timing assumptions into one view. Maybe it's shipping or inventory that needs tracked most.

Operations Delivery Tracker Demonstration data

Order: WO-10004 B2002
Remaining work: 99 hrs
Start: Sep 01
Promise date: Sep 13
Projected date: Sep 11 2 days early

Routing for demonstration order WO-10004, comparing the on-plan schedule with a six-day delay on the component FITUP depends on
Operation	Hours	Schedule
10 KIT	3
20 MATERIAL	4
30 FITUP	10
Component B2002/sub01	No hours
Component B2002/sub01 Supplied by WO-10041 Need by Sep 02 Available Sep 02 Status Clear to build FITUP has what it needs on the day it needs it.
40 ASSEMBLE	64
50 HARDWARE	13
60 INSPECT	7
70 FINAL	3
80 PACK	4

The gantt view accounts for the subcomponent availability.

That's the kind of change contextFound focuses on: taking a specific operational question and building a useful tool around it.

04 Our Process

We start with one workflow.

01

Look at how the work happens today

Where the current tools fall short, and what a useful first improvement would be.
02

Define a focused scope, then build an early version

For the people who will use it. Their feedback helps us catch the details a specification can miss.
03

Work through the practical questions

Accuracy, exceptions, access, backups, and ongoing support, before your operation depends on the tool.
04

Fit it to the systems you already have

Sometimes the right answer is a small tool connecting the gaps.

05 How it's built

AI-powered development doesn't have to mean an AI-powered solution.

We use AI heavily to build: faster, and at a cost that makes a custom tool worth considering in the first place.

That doesn't mean the tool your team runs on is guessing. For most operational work you want the same rules producing the same answer every time, so the number on the screen is one you can repeat in a meeting and defend to a customer.

We do build AI into solutions where it genuinely earns its place: reading messy inbound emails, pulling data out of PDFs, drafting a schedule for a person to approve. Where it doesn't, we leave it out.

06 Who you'll talk to

You'll be talking with me.

I'm Jason Gardner, founder of contextFound. My background combines industrial and systems engineering, hands-on production experience, and software development.

I'm interested in how the work actually gets done: the handoffs, the checks, the exceptions, and the things people have learned to work around.

You know your business. I bring manufacturing experience and a fresh set of questions. Sometimes that outside perspective is useful before we build anything.

Engineering: Industrial and systems engineering
Operations: Hands-on production experience
Build: Software development

07 Your information

We can talk about the process without exposing your business.

You don't need to send customer lists, pricing, drawings, or production records to start a conversation.

We can work from a description, a blank template, or anonymized sample data. If an NDA needs to come first, let's arrange that.

A description in your own words
A blank template
Anonymized sample data
An NDA first, if you need one

08 The 20-minute offer

Give me 20 minutes and a workflow that's harder than it should be.

Tell me what it needs to accomplish, who relies on it, and where the work gets difficult.

Afterward you receive a written Workflow Opportunity Brief

The scope of the current problem
Root cause challenges to your current solution
What an ideal future state could look like
Where AI development or solution might help

The report is entirely yours - whether you have contextFound build your better future or not.

There's no obligation to commission a build.

It doesn't have to be this hard.