SM Ashiqurzamman · SyntheStudio
Full-Service Digital Studio · Web, Mobile & AI Software
Project Proposal
AI Commerce OS
AI Voice + WhatsApp Order-Taking SaaS Platform
Confidential — prepared exclusively for the named recipient.
Section 01
Executive Summary
Small businesses that take a high volume of phone orders lose revenue every day to missed and unanswered calls. This proposal sets out a plan to build AI Commerce OS — a multi-tenant SaaS platform that answers inbound calls with an AI voice agent, takes and confirms orders over a conversational WhatsApp agent, automatically recovers missed calls into WhatsApp conversations, and routes every order into a single management dashboard.
The platform is delivered in clearly defined phases. Phase 1 is a focused, fixed-price MVP / pilot that proves the core value — answer calls, recover missed orders, and manage them in one place — for a real business. Phases 2 and 3 extend the MVP into a full commercial SaaS with loyalty, marketing automation, deeper AI memory, and enterprise capabilities, to be commissioned separately once the pilot succeeds.
Important: no voice model is built from scratch. The system integrates proven voice AI platforms (Vapi / Retell) with the WhatsApp Business API and a custom backend and dashboard. The client owns all source code and all platform accounts and can run and maintain the system independently.
At a glance
Section 02
Understanding the Problem
During peak hours, staff cannot answer every call. Each missed call is a potential lost order and a customer who may not call back. Static auto-replies do not solve this — a customer who reaches a voicemail or an unanswered line rarely completes the order on their own.
The goal is therefore not only to answer more calls, but to actively recover the ones that are missed and to make ordering effortless across both voice and chat — while giving the business clear visibility and control over every order in one place.
What success looks like
- Fewer missed orders — calls are answered by AI when staff cannot pick up.
- Missed calls are recovered — the customer is reached on WhatsApp and can finish the order in chat, not just receive an apology message.
- One source of truth — orders from both voice and WhatsApp land in the same dashboard.
- A personal feel — the AI remembers returning customers and their usual orders.
- Full ownership — the business runs the system itself, with clean code and documentation.
Section 03
Solution Overview
AI Commerce OS is a multi-tenant platform. A single deployment serves many businesses (tenants), each fully isolated from the others. The platform is sold as a subscription, with three operating roles:
| Role | Who it is / what they do |
|---|---|
| Super-Admin | The platform owner. Manages all shops, subscriptions, billing, platform-wide usage and cost, and support. |
| Shop-Admin | The subscribing business owner. Manages their shop, branches, orders, customers, and their own plan. |
| Branch-Admin | A per-branch operator under a Shop-Admin. Manages orders and customers for a single branch only. |
Tenant isolation: each shop's data — orders, customers, and AI memory — is strictly separated. One shop can never access another shop's data. The AI that serves Shop A remembers only Shop A's customers.
3.1 Core Capabilities
Inbound AI Voice Agent
- Answers incoming calls and understands the configured language(s).
- Captures a structured order (product + quantity), reads it back, and confirms.
- Recognises returning customers and can offer their usual order.
- Stores a transcript and recording against every call log.
- Routes to a branch and can transfer to a human for complex requests.
WhatsApp AI Agent
- A genuinely conversational agent — not a static template — that greets, understands, captures or confirms an order, and gets a clear confirmation.
- Works both as a standalone ordering channel and as the destination for missed-call recovery.
- Hands every confirmed order to the same backend and dashboard as the voice channel.
Missed-Call → WhatsApp Recovery
- Detects missed, busy, or unanswered calls via the telephony layer.
- Automatically reaches the customer on WhatsApp and continues the conversation through the AI agent, so the order can be completed in chat.
- Supports a callback request as an alternative.
Order Management Dashboard
- A single view of incoming orders from both voice and WhatsApp, tagged by channel.
- Order status pipeline, customer profiles, search, filter, and export.
- Role-specific views: each role sees exactly what is relevant to them.
Per-Shop AI Memory
- Each shop's AI remembers its own customers — name, preferred language, favourite order, and history — to make the experience feel personal and improve repeat business.
- Memory is scoped per shop and never shared across tenants.
Section 04
Technical Architecture
The architecture favours a single shared platform with strict logical isolation per tenant. This keeps operating costs and complexity low at MVP stage while remaining a true multi-tenant SaaS that can scale.
High-level flow
Customer → (Phone via Twilio → Vapi/Retell Voice AI) or (WhatsApp via Meta Cloud API) → Backend API (NestJS) → Shared LLM with per-tenant context → PostgreSQL (tenant-scoped) → Dashboard (Next.js)
| Layer | Responsibility |
|---|---|
| Marketing website | Public site, SEO, plan information, lead capture and signup. |
| Dashboard app | Role-based UI for Super-Admin, Shop-Admin, and Branch-Admin. |
| Backend API | Auth, tenancy, orders, customers, billing, webhooks, AI orchestration. |
| Voice AI | Vapi/Retell handle speech; function calls push structured orders to the backend. |
| WhatsApp AI | Backend conversation state machine + LLM for natural chat ordering. |
| Data layer | PostgreSQL with tenant_id isolation; Redis for queues and caching. |
| AI layer | Shared LLM with per-tenant system prompt and customer profile injected at runtime. |
Multi-tenancy approach. For the MVP: a shared database and schema with a tenant_id column on every tenant-scoped table. Every backend query is automatically scoped to the authenticated user's shop and branch, so data can never leak across tenants. At scale, the model can evolve toward separate schemas or databases per tenant — deliberately deferred.
Section 05
Technology Stack
Every choice below is selected for reliability, maintainability, and full client ownership — no proprietary lock-in, and a single TypeScript language across front and back end.
| Layer | Technology | Why this choice |
|---|---|---|
| Frontend | Next.js, React, TypeScript, TailwindCSS, shadcn/ui | Fast, modern, clean dashboards and marketing site from one codebase. |
| Backend | Node.js + NestJS (TypeScript) | Structured, modular backend; same language as the frontend, end to end. |
| Database | PostgreSQL | Reliable relational store; clean tenant_id isolation. |
| ORM | Prisma | Type-safe queries and clean migrations. |
| Cache / Queue | Redis + BullMQ | Sessions, rate limiting, and delayed jobs (e.g. timed missed-call follow-ups). |
| Voice AI | Vapi (primary) / Retell (alternative) | Proven platforms integrated, per requirement — no model built from scratch. |
| Telephony | Twilio | Phone numbers, missed/unanswered-call detection, recording. |
| Meta WhatsApp Cloud API | Official, lowest-cost path; no reseller markup. | |
| LLM | OpenAI / Claude (cost-tiered) | Cheaper model for routine orders; stronger model only when needed. |
| AI memory (MVP) | PostgreSQL profile fields | Remembers usual orders without the cost of a vector database. |
| Auth | JWT with role claims | Stateless, secure, easy to extend later. |
| Billing & Payments | Stripe + bKash, Nagad, SSLCommerz | Recurring card billing via Stripe; POS and local gateway options for in-store and regional payments. |
| Hosting | Docker + Coolify on client-owned VPS | Full client ownership, no vendor lock-in, low cost at small scale. |
| Monitoring | Sentry + usage/cost logging | Error tracking plus per-tenant usage metering for the cost model. |
Section 06
Phased Delivery Plan
The platform is built in three phases. Each phase is a standalone, fixed-price contract that delivers working value on its own — the pilot proves the concept before any commitment to the larger build.
| Phase | Focus | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Phase 1 — MVP / Pilot | Core order-taking + recovery | A live, working system proving missed-order recovery for a real business. |
| Phase 2 — Growth | Retention + marketing + analytics | Tools that increase repeat orders and revenue per shop. |
| Phase 3 — Enterprise | Scale + integrations + resale | A full commercial SaaS ready for many clients and large accounts. |
6.1 Phase 1 — MVP / Pilot (this contract)
Objective: prove the core value — answer calls, recover missed orders, and manage everything in one dashboard — for a real pilot business, on a fixed price.
Included
- Inbound AI voice agent (Vapi/Retell + Twilio): order capture, read-back, confirmation, transcript and recording per call.
- Conversational WhatsApp AI agent (Meta Cloud API): standalone ordering and order confirmation.
- Missed/unanswered-call detection and automatic WhatsApp recovery, plus callback request.
- Order management dashboard with unified voice + WhatsApp orders, status pipeline, search, filter, and export.
- Simple per-shop customer profile and memory (favourite order, language, history) — no vector database.
- Multi-tenant role system: Super-Admin, Shop-Admin, Branch-Admin, with role-scoped dashboards.
- Basic subscription/plan assignment and usage logging.
- Lean marketing website (home, features, pricing, demo, signup, contact).
- Telephony setup, transcriptions, and per-call logs.
- Full documentation and clean handover of all code and accounts.
Explicitly excluded (delivered in later phases)
- Loyalty points, broadcast marketing, inventory and staff management.
- Vector-database / RAG long-term memory.
- White-labeling, ERP/POS integrations, franchise tools.
- Fully automated self-serve billing lifecycle and multi-currency.
Phase 1 deliverables
- Working multi-tenant application (voice + WhatsApp + dashboard) deployed to the client's infrastructure.
- Source code repositories, fully owned by the client.
- All platform accounts (Twilio, Vapi/Retell, Meta, LLM, hosting) set up under the client's ownership.
- Technical and operational documentation, plus a handover walkthrough.
- A usage-and-cost report from the pilot to inform subscription pricing.
6.2 Phase 2 — Growth
Objective: turn the working MVP into a platform that drives repeat business and revenue per shop.
- Loyalty system — points, tiers (Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum), coupons, birthday and cashback rewards.
- Marketing automation — WhatsApp broadcast campaigns, promotions, and an AI campaign-content generator.
- Advanced AI memory — vector database (e.g. Qdrant) and RAG for richer, longer-term customer context.
- Customer CRM — lifetime value, complaints, notes, full communication history.
- Analytics dashboards — revenue, peak hours, retention, top products, missed-call recovery, AI metrics.
- Delivery operations — rider assignment, zones, radius, pickup management.
- Richer ordering — voice-note and image-based ordering, cart management, in-chat payment links.
- Inventory awareness — AI stops offering out-of-stock items.
6.3 Phase 3 — Enterprise & Scale
Objective: make the platform a full commercial SaaS ready to serve many clients, large accounts, and resellers.
- White-label — custom logo, domain, colours, and branding per shop.
- Public REST API and webhooks for third-party integrations.
- ERP / POS / delivery-platform integrations.
- Franchise management for multi-location brands.
- Full self-serve billing lifecycle — trials, upgrades, downgrades, overage billing, annual plans, multi-currency.
- Enterprise compliance tooling — granular data retention, full GDPR workflows, audit depth.
- Scalability — schema/database-per-tenant where justified, multi-region, multi-number support.
- Employee management — staff, attendance, performance, delivery ratings.
Section 07
Unit-Cost Model & Service Pricing
Approximate mid-2026 market rates. Confirmed against live provider pricing at contract time.
7.1 Per-Use Costs (cost to serve, per shop)
These are platform running costs paid to third parties — not what you charge the shop. Subscription prices are built on top with margin.
| Service | Approx. unit cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Voice AI orchestration (Vapi) | ~$0.05 / min platform fee | Base platform fee only; STT, LLM and TTS billed on top. |
| Voice — all-in (STT + LLM + TTS + telephony) | ~$0.13–$0.31 / min | Realistic blended cost. Budget ~$0.20/min as a working average. |
| Retell (alternative to Vapi) | ~$0.07+ / min base | Bring-your-own-LLM; all-in typically ~$0.11–$0.15/min. |
| Telephony — phone number (Twilio) | ~$1–$2 / month per number | One number per shop/branch. |
| Telephony — inbound minutes (Twilio) | ~$0.0085–$0.014 / min | Varies by country; on top of voice AI cost. |
| WhatsApp — service messages | Free within 24-hr window | ~1,000 free service conversations/month per WhatsApp account. |
| WhatsApp — utility template | ~$0.004–$0.045 / msg | Used for missed-call follow-up and confirmations outside the free window. |
| WhatsApp — marketing template | ~$0.01–$0.14 / msg | Promotions/broadcasts (Phase 2); country-dependent. |
| LLM tokens (WhatsApp chat turn) | fractions of a cent / turn | With a cost-tiered model (e.g. GPT-4o-mini / Claude Haiku). |
7.2 Suggested Subscription Plans
| Plan | Approx. price / mo | Includes (suggested) |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | $39–$59 | WhatsApp AI only, single branch, ~1,000 messages, basic dashboard & analytics. |
| Growth | $99–$149 | Voice AI + WhatsApp, up to 3 branches, customer memory, missed-call recovery, capped voice minutes. |
| Pro | $249–$399 | Unlimited branches, full AI memory, higher usage caps, advanced analytics, priority support. |
| Enterprise | Custom | White-label, API access, franchise tools, dedicated support (Phase 3). |
Usage caps matter: each plan should include a fair-use voice/message allowance, with overage billed per unit.
7.3 Built-in safeguard
The platform logs voice minutes, WhatsApp messages, and AI tokens per shop. The Phase 1 pilot produces real usage data, which is used to finalise Starter / Growth / Pro pricing before going to market — ensuring every plan is profitable from day one.
Section 08
Build Services, Minimum Requirements & Setup Pricing
8.1 One-Time Build (Phase 1 MVP development)
| Work item | Approx. range | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Multi-tenant backend + roles + DB | included in MVP | Auth, tenancy, Super/Shop/Branch roles, schema. |
| Order dashboard (3 roles) | included in MVP | Live orders, status pipeline, search, export. |
| Voice AI integration | included in MVP | Vapi/Retell + Twilio, order capture, transcripts. |
| WhatsApp AI agent | included in MVP | Conversational ordering + missed-call recovery. |
| Customer memory (simple) | included in MVP | Per-shop profile and usual-order recall. |
| Lean marketing website | included in MVP | Home, features, pricing, demo, signup, contact. |
| Documentation & handover | included in MVP | Full docs + walkthrough; client owns everything. |
| Total fixed Phase 1 price | confirmed at contract | Quoted as one fixed price after discovery call. |
8.2 Third-Party Accounts & Minimum Setup
| Service | Min. to start | Requirement / notes |
|---|---|---|
| Twilio (telephony) | ~$20 credit + number | Account verification; ~$1–$2/mo per number. |
| Vapi or Retell (voice AI) | ~$10–$20 credit | Standard developer signup; pay-as-you-go. |
| Meta WhatsApp Cloud API | $0 to start | Business verification + a phone number; free tier covers initial usage. |
| LLM provider (OpenAI / Claude) | ~$10 credit | API key with a small prepaid balance. |
| VPS (hosting) | ~$10–$30 / month | Standard Linux VPS for the app, database, and queues. |
| Domain name | ~$10–$15 / year | Registered under client ownership. |
| Stripe (subscriptions) | $0 to start | Standard account verification; pay-as-you-go fees. |
8.3 Approximate Monthly Running Cost (platform owner)
| Item | Approx. cost / mo | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| VPS hosting | $10–$30 | Single VPS comfortably runs the MVP and pilot. |
| Domain | ~$1 | Annual fee, amortised. |
| Sentry / monitoring | $0–$26 | Free tier sufficient at pilot scale. |
| Backups & object storage | $1–$5 | Database snapshots and call recording storage. |
| Email (transactional) | $0–$10 | For password resets, receipts, alerts. |
Recommended minimum to launch the pilot: verified Twilio account with one number, Vapi/Retell account, verified Meta WhatsApp Business account, LLM API key, one VPS, and a domain. Total upfront out-of-pocket to go live (excluding development) is on the order of $50–$120 plus per-use charges.
Section 09
Delivery Process
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| 1. Discovery | Confirm languages, order flows, branches, and pilot business details. |
| 2. Audit & setup | Provision accounts (Twilio, Vapi/Retell, Meta, LLM, hosting) under client ownership. |
| 3. Build | Implement data model, roles, dashboards, and AI channels in the build order below. |
| 4. Review | Demo each milestone; gather and apply feedback. |
| 5. Pilot | Run the live system with the pilot business; capture usage and cost data. |
| 6. Handover | Documentation, walkthrough, and full transfer of code and accounts. |
Phase 1 build order
- Multi-tenant database schema, authentication, and role system.
- Order dashboard for all three roles, validated with test orders.
- Twilio + voice AI integration — voice orders flowing into the dashboard.
- WhatsApp Cloud API + conversation agent — chat orders into the same dashboard.
- Missed-call → WhatsApp recovery, tightening the two channels together.
- Customer memory wired into both voice and WhatsApp.
- Lean marketing site, plan assignment, and pilot launch.
Section 10
Ownership, Security & Compliance
Ownership & handover
- • Client owns 100% of source code and all platform accounts.
- • Full documentation and handover walkthrough; client runs and maintains the system independently.
Security
- • Hashed passwords, JWT auth, role-based access on every endpoint.
- • Strict tenant scoping — Branch-Admin can't see other branches; Shop-Admin can't see other shops.
- • Call recordings and transcripts stored with per-shop scoping and access logging.
Compliance (MVP)
- • Recording-consent notice in the voice agent's greeting.
- • Respect for WhatsApp's 24-hour service window and approved templates.
- • Basic customer-data deletion; full GDPR workflows in a later phase.
Section 11
Commercials & Engagement
Engagement model: fixed-price, paid contract per phase. Phase 1 (MVP / Pilot) is contracted now. Phases 2 and 3 are optional and commissioned separately once the pilot demonstrates value.
Pricing: the fixed Phase 1 price is confirmed after the discovery call, once languages, branch count, and integration specifics are agreed.
Ongoing work: after a successful pilot there is scope for Phase 2/3 features, additional locations or clients, and an optional monthly maintenance retainer.
Section 12
Why SyntheStudio
- Right stack, end to end. Full-stack and mobile expertise across React, Next.js, Node.js, TypeScript, and PostgreSQL — plus hands-on AI/LLM integration (OpenAI, Claude, chatbots, RAG).
- A proven studio team. SyntheStudio is a full-service digital studio (founded 2019) delivering web, mobile, and AI software for clients across the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, and Southeast Asia.
- Integration-first, as required. Integrates proven voice platforms (Vapi/Retell), the WhatsApp Business API, and Twilio — exactly as specified — rather than reinventing them.
- Built for ownership. Clean, documented, maintainable code and client-owned accounts, so the business is never locked in.
- Commercially disciplined. A real unit-cost model ensures the SaaS is profitable, not just functional.
- A genuine partner for the roadmap. The phased plan is structured so the relationship can grow from a successful pilot into the full platform.
Next step
A short discovery call to confirm languages, order flows, branch setup, and the pilot business — after which the fixed Phase 1 price and milestone schedule are finalised and work can begin.
SM Ashiqurzamman — Founder, SyntheStudio
Dhaka, Bangladesh
Web · Mobile · AI Software | Node.js · Django · React / Next.js · Android · AI Integration
Confidential · Document v1.0