Jim Heintz – Co-Founder & Lead Developer
Starting in the early 80’s, Jim has been developing music plugins and applications ever since. He’s worked on early MIDI sequencers, video game sound, virtual analog synthesis, guitar and vocal effects, tempo/beat analysis, and many other areas.
While still in high school, Jim worked for a startup company out of LA called Home Studio Inc., and worked on developing MIDI hardware and software for the Apple II computer. While in college, Jim had a co-op job at Sierra Online, and worked on many of their games including Silpheed, which was one of the earliest games to offer a multitimbral sound track.
Founder of Way Out Ware, Jim released TimewARP 2600 in 2003, KikAXXE in 2006, iSample in 2009, and SynthX in 2011.
Way Out Ware was acquired by inMusic in 2014, and Jim continued to develop many products for inMusic until leaving inMusic in 2024.
Jay O’Reilly – Co-Founder & Creative Lead
Through those years, I became the go-to guy in my circle for second opinions. Friends and fellow artists would send me their rough tracks asking, “What’s missing?” or “Why doesn’t this hit like the reference track?” I realized pretty quickly how common that struggle was and how limited the tools were for artists trying to bridge that gap on their own.
That’s when I crossed paths with Jim Heintz, a brilliant developer and musician in his own right. We met through the music-tech community and connected over the same mission. We both wanted to create something that made mixing more intuitive and more empowering for independent artists. Jim brought the technical depth to bring those ideas to life, and I brought the obsessive ears and vision to shape the product around real-world audio needs.
Together, we founded Sifu Audio, and our first product, Mix Dojo, came to life. Mix Dojo is a music mixing assistant built to help artists compare their tracks to industry-level references and get actionable feedback fast. It doesn’t just listen. It guides you, like a trusted engineer in your corner.
Sifu Audio isn’t just about software. It’s about mentorship, clarity, and giving creators tools that elevate their sound without slowing down their creativity. For me, this is the natural next step in a journey that started with chasing better mixes for myself and ended with helping others do the same.