Astra Way: Democratizing the Next Wave of Software
Astra Way: Democratizing the Next Wave of Software
Oct 27, 2025
Joao Henrique, Pedro Souto
Astra Way
The software world is changing again.
How we develop software changed a lot over the last few decades. We explore more about these transitions in the text: "From Transistors to Low-Code: Levels of Abstraction in Programming"
But to summarize things, development gained many tools that helped more businesses and users get access to its benefits. That happened with new languages like Python and also with new technologies like Cloud Computing.
One step in this evolution was low-code technologies. Platforms that allow users to build solutions using less code and therefore bringing many benefits out-of-the-box. Development became faster, more secure, accessible and democratic. Suddenly, you didn’t need to be a full-stack engineer to create your e-commerce (Thanks, Shopify!) or your website (Thanks, Framer!).
Then came AI, a new kind of power unlocked. But this time, development hit new barriers: you needed GPUs, complex frameworks, manage infrastructure, or a deep understanding of LLMs and orchestration. The potential was huge, but the gatekeepers were back.
Now, a new convergence is emerging: low-code meets AI.
And with it, development changes again, but now for AI-first applications and automations.
That said, we believe low-code tools are a great way to bring AI benefits to more people, in a faster and more maintainable way.
In fact, we believe that most companies are better served by an AI agent in a n8n (one example of low-code platform) workflow than maintaining a more complex infrastructure running a very low-level agent framework. It all depends on the use case, context matters.
Along the past months, we have seen the first solution being better for many cases in terms of costs, speed, and business outcomes.
So, if AI is easier to build than ever, why aren’t more businesses already thriving with it?
Because, as always, there are a few caveats.
There are three problems for that reality to come to life.
The Three Problems
Most people who deeply understand AI are focused on the tech itself, not the business. They experiment endlessly, but rarely ask the most important question: why does this matter for value creation?
The ones who understand the business usually aren’t technical enough to see what’s newly possible. Some try to “vibe-code” their way into AI prototypes, but end up with fragile, insecure, and underperforming solutions. All far from the potential.
The rare few who understand both sides often overcomplicate things, applying low-level frameworks to problems that could have been solved with simpler, more maintainable tools.
These three gaps are what separate what’s possible from what’s actually happening.
How to solve it?
Given that situation, we asked ourselves:
What if there was a studio built specifically to bridge these worlds?
A place where:
People deeply understand AI: true technologists.
People understand business: not just operations, but strategy, able to ask: “What should we solve for next?”
People with technical breadth to pick the right type of technology for the job, building solutions that work, not monuments to complexity.
Such studio would be very helpful to founders and executives who want to bring AI to their businesses. Otherwise, they would have to suffer with one (or more) of the 3 problems mentioned.
That’s Astra Studio. This convergence of skills, mixing technology and business knowledge, is what we call being a "Product" studio.
We exist to bring the AI that already works into the hands of businesses, turning technological potential into practical ROI.
The famous quote by William Gibson applies again "The future is already here; it’s just unevenly distributed". At Astra, we are taking on that mission!
Are you a founder or executive looking to make sense of this new AI wave? Astra is your place of clarity. Schedule a call to discuss "What should we solve for next?" and then have it built flawlessly by our team.
The software world is changing again.
How we develop software changed a lot over the last few decades. We explore more about these transitions in the text: "From Transistors to Low-Code: Levels of Abstraction in Programming"
But to summarize things, development gained many tools that helped more businesses and users get access to its benefits. That happened with new languages like Python and also with new technologies like Cloud Computing.
One step in this evolution was low-code technologies. Platforms that allow users to build solutions using less code and therefore bringing many benefits out-of-the-box. Development became faster, more secure, accessible and democratic. Suddenly, you didn’t need to be a full-stack engineer to create your e-commerce (Thanks, Shopify!) or your website (Thanks, Framer!).
Then came AI, a new kind of power unlocked. But this time, development hit new barriers: you needed GPUs, complex frameworks, manage infrastructure, or a deep understanding of LLMs and orchestration. The potential was huge, but the gatekeepers were back.
Now, a new convergence is emerging: low-code meets AI.
And with it, development changes again, but now for AI-first applications and automations.
That said, we believe low-code tools are a great way to bring AI benefits to more people, in a faster and more maintainable way.
In fact, we believe that most companies are better served by an AI agent in a n8n (one example of low-code platform) workflow than maintaining a more complex infrastructure running a very low-level agent framework. It all depends on the use case, context matters.
Along the past months, we have seen the first solution being better for many cases in terms of costs, speed, and business outcomes.
So, if AI is easier to build than ever, why aren’t more businesses already thriving with it?
Because, as always, there are a few caveats.
There are three problems for that reality to come to life.
The Three Problems
Most people who deeply understand AI are focused on the tech itself, not the business. They experiment endlessly, but rarely ask the most important question: why does this matter for value creation?
The ones who understand the business usually aren’t technical enough to see what’s newly possible. Some try to “vibe-code” their way into AI prototypes, but end up with fragile, insecure, and underperforming solutions. All far from the potential.
The rare few who understand both sides often overcomplicate things, applying low-level frameworks to problems that could have been solved with simpler, more maintainable tools.
These three gaps are what separate what’s possible from what’s actually happening.
How to solve it?
Given that situation, we asked ourselves:
What if there was a studio built specifically to bridge these worlds?
A place where:
People deeply understand AI: true technologists.
People understand business: not just operations, but strategy, able to ask: “What should we solve for next?”
People with technical breadth to pick the right type of technology for the job, building solutions that work, not monuments to complexity.
Such studio would be very helpful to founders and executives who want to bring AI to their businesses. Otherwise, they would have to suffer with one (or more) of the 3 problems mentioned.
That’s Astra Studio. This convergence of skills, mixing technology and business knowledge, is what we call being a "Product" studio.
We exist to bring the AI that already works into the hands of businesses, turning technological potential into practical ROI.
The famous quote by William Gibson applies again "The future is already here; it’s just unevenly distributed". At Astra, we are taking on that mission!
Are you a founder or executive looking to make sense of this new AI wave? Astra is your place of clarity. Schedule a call to discuss "What should we solve for next?" and then have it built flawlessly by our team.