Show Notes
On the podcast: Sofia Larsson and César Pinto Castillo share how they built their company Ambi Studi and their flagship app Ambre, a recipe book and meal planner that lets you save recipes from any site, photo, or app and syncs privately across your Apple devices. They talk about César's college thesis turning into real production software for Volvo, Sofia's pivot from textile engineering into iOS development during a career burnout, a $150 Mac that couldn't even compile his first app, a "welcome call" from Apple Entrepreneur Camp that turned out to be a two-hour technical interview, and why design is becoming the real differentiator now that building software is easy.
Top Takeaways: 🍎 The scary outcome is getting in Applying is easy to put off when the worst case isn't rejection but acceptance, because then you have to do the thing. Apply anyway; the program will build the confidence you were waiting to feel first. 💻 Say yes, then buy the tools Agreeing to build an iPhone app with no Mac, no iPhone, and no idea what Xcode was worked out fine; the fee paid for the first Mac, and the wrong Mac before it was just tuition.
🔤 The first barrier to coding is vocabulary, not logic You can't Google a modifier if you don't know it's called a modifier. Describing the problem in the wrong words to a tool that answers anyway is what gets a beginner unstuck.
🎨 Post about what nobody else in your community posts about When every timeline is APIs and SDKs, a thread about a color combination or a layout that reads better stands out, and that difference builds a following. ✨ When AI writes the features, the experience is what's left to compete on Users don't read the code any more than they read assembly. Performance, solving the problem, and doing it in a beautiful way are what you own now.
About Sofia Larsson and César Pinto Castillo:
Sofia Larsson is a Co-Founder, iOS Engineer, and UI/UX Designer at Ambi Studio, and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Textile Sciences and Engineering. César Pinto Castillo is also a Co-Founder at Ambi Studio, a product company focusing on the Apple Platform. Our goal is to make accessible and user-friendly apps with a focus on privacy. 👋 Sofia Larsson’s LinkedIn
👋César Pinto Castillo’s LinkedIn 🌐 Learn more about Ambi Studio 🥘 Learn more about Ambre
🖥️ Ambi Studio GitHub
💭Ambi Studio on Mastadon
Follow us on X: Charlie Chapman - @_chuckyc RevenueCat - @RevenueCat Launched - @LaunchedFM
Episode Highlights: [00:00] Meet Sofia Larsson and César Pinto Castillo [03:29] César's winding road to a computer science degree [09:12] César discovers iOS and builds his first app [15:47] Sofia's path from textile engineering to software [28:22] Learning Swift without a traditional tech background [29:46] The forgotten "Cooking" app users wouldn't let die [33:32] How rewriting it in SwiftUI became Sofia's real classroom [37:06] Apple Entrepreneur Camp and the "welcome call" that built her confidence [46:39] Turning a forgotten side project into client opportunities [47:43] Why design helped Ambre stand out [51:27] Finding inspiration beyond famous tech icons [54:12] Why finishing projects is harder than starting [58:49] Why design and user experience matter more in the AI era [1:02:07] AI makes building more accessible to creators
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