Our Story

From one kitchen
to a platform. A prototype for one community kitchen first.

Today we harden the product with Our Big Kitchen in live operations — then widen the invite.

🍳 OBK The Kitchen 2023 Where it started 🔍 Problem Found 2024 No tools for this ⚙️ First Build 2024 Prototype tested 🚀 LIVE Live Pilot 2025 → Now Running at OBK 🌐 Platform Ahead Wider rollout "Great technology should disappear. Only the mission should show." From one Sydney kitchen to infrastructure for the sector
The Journey

How we got here. From kitchen to platform.

"Great technology should serve those who care for our most vulnerable — we have the skills to make that happen." — The founding volunteers

April 2025
01 — The Beginning

The Beginning

Shaina Slavin saw her parents' community kitchen juggling donations, volunteers, and meals with tools that were never meant for that pace. She built a focused prototype for their workflows — enough to prove the idea, not yet enough to carry every organisation alone.

August 2025
02 — The Collaboration

The Collaboration

Volunteer engineers joined to shape something durable: a modular layer that sits on Salesforce and NetSuite instead of replacing them. The work looks like disciplined reviews, shared ownership, and build time most NGOs could not fund as a traditional vendor engagement.

November 2025
03 — The Vision

The Vision

Harish Palagummi widened the lens from a single site to a product other NGOs could adopt: same enterprise platforms underneath, clearer screens for coordinators and volunteers on top. The build stays modular — so each organisation keeps its stack while Civium handles the day-to-day interface work.

Now →
Building toward launch

Building Toward Launch

Still volunteer-led, still anchored to Our Big Kitchen as the operating pilot, and still targeting February 2026. The roadmap is simple: ship what survives real shifts, document what breaks, repeat.

Who's Building It

The team building Civium. Volunteer engineers building tools that serve communities.

BN

Bikram Neupane

Backend Lead
CT

Charm Torralba

Project Manager
HP

Harish Palagummi

Executive & Network Builder
JK

Jim Kong

Tech Lead
SC

Simon Corlette

Business & CRM Lead
SK

Sweta Kumari

Frontend Lead
SS

Shaina Slavin

Project Lead
THE NEXT CHAPTER FOR NGOS 🏛 Your organisation. Your mission. Request early access for your programme. ✓ Shift scheduling ✓ One-tap check-in ✓ Impact reporting ✓ CRM-ready data I FOR BUILDERS Your code. Real impact. Contribute to production software that matters. ✓ Live codebase ✓ Real users, real stakes ✓ Equity pathway ✓ Sector-wide scale II Both paths start at civiumtech.com/join
Ready to Begin

Help write the next chapter. Both paths start here.

Request early access for your organisation — or raise your hand to help build. We read every note.