Alphawave merges Saigen and Callbi, names ex-Skynamo chief Clarke as CEO
What's the deal? South African technology group AlphawaveDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has merged its two speech-technology businesses, SaigenDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → and CallbiDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, into a single company trading as Saigen, with Sam Clarke as chief executive officer.
What do they do? Saigen builds AI-powered speech recognition for under-resourced languages and specialised domains, including code-switching across South African languages within a single utterance. Callbi, built on the Saigen engine, transcribes and analyses contact centre conversations for quality assurance, compliance, and operational insight; its name will be retained for that business.
The strategic rationale: The two businesses have operated as closely linked companies for years. Formalising them into one removes duplication and merges the research team that builds the speech models with the engineering team that builds the product.
"Saigen and Callbi have built genuinely competitive technology in a field dominated by much larger international companies," said Frans Meyer, chief executive officer of Alphawave. "Formalising them into one company removes duplication and puts a dedicated chief executive behind the opportunity."
The new hire: Clarke was appointed by the Alphawave board after global business management software provider KlipboardDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → acquired Skynamo, where he led as chief executive officer for 14 years. Gert Fourie continues to lead Callbi and joins the combined company's executive team, while Charl van Heerden continues to lead research and AI.
What changes for customers? Very little at first. "Saigen's speech recognition services continue without change," Clarke said, adding that customers keep the same APIs, endpoints, commercial terms, and support contacts, while Callbi customers retain their account teams and reseller agreements.
What's the endgame? Callbi now processes hundreds of thousands of calls daily, and the merger is designed to speed up how fast research turns into product. The combined company also plans to make its speech technology available to integrators and partners in domains beyond contact centre analytics.
The signal: The tie-up is a bet that a locally built speech engine can compete against far larger international players by tightening the loop between AI research and commercial delivery — with the pivot from strong technology to strong execution now resting on Clarke.
Read more: it-online.co.za
Image credit: Generated with Gemini
