A Ugandan entrepreneur who developed an artificial intelligence-powered note-taking service after struggling with Korean-language university lectures has built a startup now used by learners in more than 100 countries.
Hamza Kyamanywa, 27, developed HoverNotes while studying electrical engineering at Korea University in South Korea.
The web-based platform uses AI to analyse lecture videos, combining spoken explanations with visual information from slides, diagrams, code and demonstrations to produce structured study notes.
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Unlike conventional transcription tools that primarily convert speech into text, HoverNotes is designed to interpret both the audio and visual elements of a lecture.
It can also generate notes in more than 20 major languages, allowing, for example, an English-language lecture to be converted into Korean notes or a Korean lecture into English.
"People don't write down everything during a lecture," Kyamanywa told Yonhap News Agency in Seoul, South Korea.
"They pick out the important points and organize them so they're easier to review later. HoverNotes works the same way."
The idea emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Kyamanywa found himself repeatedly replaying recorded university lectures delivered in Korean.
"It was exhausting," he recalled. "That's when I started thinking about whether AI could make the process of understanding lectures and taking notes much easier."
HoverNotes was launched in beta in November 2024 and has since attracted active users in more than 100 countries. Its Chrome Web Store listing shows about 20,000 users, while the company has surpassed 600 paying subscribers.
Kyamanywa said the startup generated more than US$10,000 in gross revenue in June.
The entrepreneur has also chosen a different approach to handling users' study records. Rather than storing notes on cloud servers, HoverNotes saves them directly on users' computers as portable text files.
He said the model is intended to give users greater control over their own study materials.
From scholarship student to entrepreneur
Kyamanywa first travelled to South Korea in 2018 under the Korean Government Scholarship Program.
He spent his first year learning Korean at Sun Moon University before enrolling at Korea University, where he studied electrical engineering.
Despite having to adjust to a new language, unfamiliar food and a different climate, he performed strongly academically and received several academic excellence awards.
He also sent part of his scholarship allowance to his family in Uganda and continues to support the education of his two younger brothers.
While at university, Kyamanywa also worked as an extra in Korean films and television productions to supplement his income.
Although his academic background was in electrical engineering, he taught himself programming and coding and began working for a Seoul-based IT company before completing his degree.
He remained with the company for three years as a software developer.
"I always start with the problem," he said. "AI is just a tool."
Kyamanywa initially had no plans to become an entrepreneur. However, the idea of using AI to simplify video-based learning remained with him while he worked as a developer.
His transition to entrepreneurship came after the company downsized and he accepted a severance package, which he used to finance his living expenses while working on HoverNotes full time.
Before leaving his job, he had incorporated the company in the United States to facilitate international payments and subscriptions.
Since then, he has largely operated the startup alone, handling software development, payment systems, customer support and administrative work.
His former employer also influenced his approach to entrepreneurship, introducing him to books and essays for startup founders, including works by renowned investor and entrepreneur Paul Graham.
Kyamanywa said the recommendations helped shape his thinking about building a technology company.
First customer
HoverNotes secured its first paying customer in November 2024.
The platform initially charged customers according to usage rather than through a monthly subscription.
While monitoring the service, Kyamanywa noticed that the first customer was about to run out of usage time. He began modifying the system to give the user additional free credits.
Before he could deploy the change, however, the customer bought more usage.
"I was shocked," he recalled.
The experience gave him an early indication that people were willing to pay for a tool that could solve a real learning problem.
Most of HoverNotes' users are university students and adult learners taking online courses.
Kyamanywa currently has no immediate plans to seek external investment, saying the company's revenue is enough to fund its development.
He believes avoiding outside capital gives him greater freedom to determine the direction of the product.
His long-term ambition is to turn HoverNotes into a broader AI learning platform incorporating real-time speech translation and other tools designed to help users understand, memorise and review educational content.
AI and the future of entrepreneurship
In addition to running HoverNotes, Kyamanywa works as an AI engineering contractor for xAI, where he evaluates the performance of artificial intelligence models.
He believes AI will lower the barriers to starting businesses by enabling individuals to perform tasks that previously required larger teams.
"AI made it possible for me to start a company without investors, co-founders or employees," he said. "As the company grows, I'll eventually hire people. AI will create more startups and, in turn, more jobs."
His entrepreneurial activities extend beyond education technology.
As the recently elected president of the Ugandans in South Korea Association (USKA), Kyamanywa created a website intended to preserve practical information for Ugandans living in South Korea, including guidance on visas and everyday life.
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He wants the platform to become a long-term knowledge base for Ugandans arriving in South Korea in the future.
He also plans to strengthen communication between the Ugandan community and Uganda's embassy in Japan, which handles consular affairs for Ugandan nationals in South Korea.
Kyamanywa has additionally developed JonjaBird, a service designed to help foreign inmates in South Korea maintain communication with relatives abroad.
The service receives handwritten letters from inmates, scans them and forwards them to relatives through WhatsApp. Replies are then printed and sent back to correctional facilities.
The name JonjaBird combines the Korean word "jeonja", meaning electronic, with the image of a bird carrying messages.
Kyamanywa said the service was created out of a belief that imprisonment should not completely sever family relationships.
Reflecting on his journey, he credited the Korean Government Scholarship Program with giving him the opportunity to study, develop his skills and build a business.
He said contributing to South Korea through his work, business and taxes was one way of giving back.
For Kyamanywa, however, the technology is secondary to the problem it is designed to solve.
"For the next 50 years, I want to spend my life finding problems in the world and building solutions that help people," he said.
