Why I'm building FORGE

For seven years, I ran a software consultancy out of Rajkot, India. Shivay Infotech. We built websites and apps for clients across India, the US, and UK.

I loved the work. I loved our clients. I loved our team.

I hated the tools.

Every morning started the same way. Gmail for client emails. Google Drive for finding proposals. DocuSign for contracts that clients hadn't signed yet. QuickBooks for invoices. WhatsApp for urgent messages. Asana for project status. Slack for team chat. Zoom for meetings. At least 9 different platforms, each with its own login, its own notification system, its own way of being slightly wrong.

A typical project lived in pieces across all 9 tools. The proposal was in Google Docs. The signed contract was in DocuSign. The project tasks were in Asana. The client's approval of design changes was buried in a WhatsApp thread from last Tuesday. The invoice was in QuickBooks. The relationship history was scattered across Gmail.

When something went wrong — a client asking “did we agree to this scope?” — finding the answer meant searching three different tools in three different interfaces. Each search took 15 minutes. Each confirmed nothing with certainty. Some days I spent more time looking for information than doing actual work.

I'm not alone in this. Every agency founder I know has the same complaint. The tool stack is broken. It was broken in 2015. It's still broken in 2026. Despite hundreds of SaaS companies and billions in VC investment.

Why hasn't anyone fixed it? Because the existing all-in-one solutions — SuiteDash, GoHighLevel, HoneyBook — tried to do everything and ended up being good at nothing. They're slow. They're complex. They require weeks of setup. They weren't built with AI. They weren't built for agencies specifically.

So I'm building FORGE.

Not because the world needs another SaaS tool. It doesn't. The world needs fewer tools, doing more together. FORGE is an attempt to replace 9 bad tools with 1 good platform.

Specifically for agencies. With AI integrated from day one. Built by someone who lived the problem.

I'm doing this solo. No co-founder. No VC money. No rushed growth. I've committed 1,800 consecutive days — five years — to building FORGE. My first goal isn't 10,000 customers or a $100M exit. My first goal is shipping one new feature every week, and having customers who love it.

If that sounds boring compared to other startup narratives, good. The quiet work is where real products get built.

I don't know if FORGE will succeed. Statistically, most bootstrapped SaaS companies don't cross $1M ARR. But I know two things:

One — the problem is real. Agencies pay too much for too many disconnected tools. Someone will solve this eventually.

Two — I'm stubborn enough to be that someone. I've lived the pain. I've quit my own day job to build this. My family's livelihood is tied to making this work.

If you're an agency owner reading this — you're my customer. I'd love for you to try FORGE. Not because I need your $29/month (I do), but because your feedback shapes what this becomes.

FORGE is just starting. What you see today at forgehq.in is the foundation. The exciting part — the 20 connected tools, the AI layer, the network effects between agencies — that's all ahead of us.

Thanks for reading. If you want to follow along, early access is open at forgehq.in.

— Nirav