Luke Romyn Launches Adebt Debt Recovery for Debt Collection
Luke Romyn launched debt collection startup Adebt Debt Recovery in January 2026 to target invoices unpaid for more than 90 days. The South African company is built for claims many businesses have already written off, turning those balances into cash that can return to their books.
Clients upload unpaid invoices and company information to Adebt’s platform, then the company analyzes each claim by age and difficulty before assigning it a performance-based fee that applies only if funds are recovered. For firms with long-outstanding receivables, the appeal is speed and less internal work once the process starts.
Romyn's 2017 UCT degree
2017 marked Romyn’s graduation from the University of Cape Town with a bachelor’s degree in finance and economics. He later worked as head of the trading desk at Blockkoin from 2022 to 2024, then served as a risk analyst at Flagright from August 2025 to January 2026, before launching Adebt.
That background gives Adebt a founder who has moved through both market-facing trading and financial crime technology. The mix fits a business that depends on evaluating risk quickly, then deciding whether a debt is worth pursuing through specialists rather than in-house staff.
Adebt's four-step process
Adebt runs a four-step process with certified debt recovery specialists across South Africa. After the upload and analysis stages, the company assigns files to professionals who locate debtors, open negotiations, and agree repayment terms.
The specialists work the case while client companies step away from follow-ups and negotiations. Debtors make repayments in installments, and Adebt automatically transfers recovered funds to the client as collections come in, reducing the lag between a recovery and the money landing on the balance sheet.
South Africa's unpaid invoices
More than 90 days of nonpayment is the line Adebt is built around, and that matters because the company is not chasing fresh receivables. It is targeting the harder end of the ledger, where businesses often stop expecting a return and leave cash idle instead.
January 2026 is the key launch point for firms that want to hand off those files rather than keep them on the desk. If Adebt can recover even a portion of the debts it takes on, the immediate result is more liquidity and less administrative drag for clients that have already spent months waiting.
