NorthHarbor Development
NorthHarbor was started by Bob Hong — an enterprise architect with a background in platform engineering, large-scale systems, and the early realities of AI-assisted development.
The premise is simple: AI coding agents are individually capable. Tools like Cursor and GitHub Copilot have proven that. But when multiple specialized agents work in parallel on the same project, a new category of problem emerges — not capability problems, but coordination problems.
Agents pick up work out of order. Two agents claim the same task. A blocker on one agent silently cascades to five others. Humans have no view across concurrent workstreams without reading raw logs.
NorthHarbor builds the coordination layer that makes multi-agent development reliable, observable, and human-controlled.
The Mission
Enable software teams to build better, faster, and safer with AI agents — without losing human control.
Every product in the NorthHarbor family is built to this mission. The platform tools (Tides, Waypoint, Pilot, Outfitter) serve engineering teams building with agents. The applications (Breezy, Sage) demonstrate what AI-assisted products look like when the coordination model is right.
How We Build
We dogfood. Breezy — our mobile PR review app — is built using Waypoint to coordinate the development work. Pilot will manage its own development. The Rising Tides blog is drafted using the same AI workflows we describe in it.
If our tools aren’t good enough to use ourselves, we haven’t finished them.
The Lighthouse
The NorthHarbor lighthouse isn’t a logo choice — it’s a design principle. The lighthouse doesn’t shout. It doesn’t need to. It holds a steady position, projects a clear signal, and lets navigators do the rest.
That’s the model for everything we build: calm, trustworthy infrastructure that makes the path forward clear.
Open Source
Waypoint is open source (Apache-2.0). The coordination primitives should be inspectable and community-owned. Commercial products built on top of the platform are proprietary.
Sage is also open source (Apache-2.0).
Get Involved
- Explore the code: github.com/northharbor-dev
- Read the blog: northharbor.dev/blog
- Get in touch: contact