Sheena Leven learned two critical lessons while building her first company, CodeSee. The first was understanding the difference between what businesses actually need versus what merely sounds visionary. The second was that fundamentals like security, compliance, reliability, and quality never go away, even when working with new technologies like AI.
After CodeSee was acquired in 2024, Leven decided to build a product enabling business owners, including those without technical backgrounds, to create AI applications. She partnered with AI researcher Sean Robinson, and together they launched Empromptu in October. This AI service allows businesses to build AI applications.
With Empromptu, a user simply tells the platform’s AI chatbot what they want, such as a new HTML or JavaScript app, and the tool builds it. It also provides LLM tools to help fine-tune results and lets companies add AI features to their existing codebases.
Leven does not consider it a vibe-coding platform, though she acknowledges competition with companies like Replit and Lovable. She describes vibe coding as excellent for quick experiments, but positions Empromptu as the tool that turns those experiments into real software. Empromptu transforms ideas into production features with built-in evaluation, governance, and self-improvement, allowing users to ship to real customers with real data and complete control. If vibe coding is the brainstorm, Empromptu is the build.
The company recently raised $2 million in a pre-seed funding round led by Precursor Ventures. Other participants included Zeal Capital, Alumni Ventures, Founders Edge, and South Loop.
Leven said the new capital will be used for hiring staff and developing new proprietary technology. The company aims to target businesses in regulated industries or deeply complex areas that involve capturing data and creating applications, such as software for the hotel industry.
Overall, Leven hopes founders will see that their businesses can be transformed without having to learn the technical skills required to leverage the AI revolution. She compares it to any other skill, noting that the beauty of this particular skill is that AI can help you learn it along the way.