Patch (patch.tech) was a SaaS startup building an acceleration layer for data warehouses. I worked on the infrastructure team, focusing on improving and maintaining the ETL pipeline and query layer.

• Built a Clojure implementation of Apache Iceberg
• Implemented an OTP-inspired actor framework for Clojure
• Worked extensively with Avro, Parquet, Kubernetes (k8s), etcd, and XTDB

Founded and led a three-year R&D effort to reimagine how distributed systems and web applications are built and deployed. While the project didn't reach its ultimate goal, it shaped me into a stronger engineer and leader.

• Designed and implemented a fault-tolerant algorithm for distributed storage and computation across large server clusters
• Created a new programming language aimed at unifying backend and database concerns, enabling novel software architectures
• Built and iterated on 40+ experimental prototypes exploring different system models and runtime designs
• Worked primarily in Rust and Clojure

Vetd was an accelerator-backed SaaS startup focused on improving how businesses buy software. As the sole technical co-founder, I built the product from the ground up and led engineering efforts until the company wound down.

• Built and deployed the initial web application as the sole engineer
• Hired and managed a small engineering team
• Designed and implemented a custom GraphQL API using WebSockets and Hasura
• Deployed production infrastructure on AWS using Fargate, RDS, and S3
• Streamlined development with custom Docker tooling
• Worked in Clojure and ClojureScript

GlobalFit is a long-standing B2B2C wellness marketplace. I was brought in to navigate a challenging cultural dynamic between leadership and engineering.

• Helped repair the strained relationship between the executive and engineering teams
• Simplified a complex and fragile production deployment pipeline
• Built trust-based relationships with each member of the engineering team
• Supported team members in identifying career growth opportunities

Magento is a leading open-source e-commerce platform. Following its acquisition of RJMetrics, I served as the senior technologist on the team responsible for transforming the RJMetrics product into Magento's business intelligence offering.

RJQL Service — Led architecture and implementation of the RJQL service — the core engine powering all automated data analysis in the product. RJQL is a proprietary query language that abstracts over diverse data sources including PostgreSQL, Redshift, and Google Analytics.

• Designed and led the implementation of a new execution engine
• Replaced legacy systems (~20k lines of PHP and Hadoop) with ~9k lines of efficient Clojure
• Significantly reduced infrastructure costs by replacing a resource-heavy solution

Cerebro (ML Initiative) — Led an exploratory effort to integrate machine learning capabilities into the product roadmap

• Created and executed a clear project plan despite ambiguous business goals
• Researched and applied collaborative filtering algorithms and academic ML concepts
• Built robust dataset generation tooling in Clojure

Second technical hire at RJMetrics, a venture-backed SaaS analytics startup acquired by Magento. Over six years, I helped scale the company from a handful of people to a mature engineering organization. As Director of Engineering, I contributed across leadership, architecture, and hands-on development. Tech included Clojure, PHP, JS, Python, MySQL, Postgres, and AWS.

• Billing system overhaul: Led architecture and implementation during vendor transition, designing a CQRS-inspired system with robust scheduling and clean state transitions
• Developer tooling: Built tools for API integration development — improved team velocity with omniscient debugging and automated test generation via HTTP traffic replay
• Chart builder & RJQL: Co-led six-month rewrite of core charting UI; designed RJQL, a domain-specific language enabling flexible queries across data sources
• Architecture & APIs: Championed transition to service-oriented architecture and helped define the internal REST API spec adopted across teams
• Mentorship & culture: Acted as a mentor and cultural anchor—supported career growth, guided teammates through tough decisions, and fostered a healthy, collaborative environment

Co-founded a two-person web studio with my cousin. As the sole developer, I was responsible for all technical decisions, architecture, and implementation across a range of custom web applications. I worked primarily with .NET, PHP, and Python, delivering tailored solutions across industries and managing everything from infrastructure to deployment.

Sayid — A debugger and profiler I wrote for Clojure.

• Becoming Omniscient with Sayid — Spoke at Conj 2016 in Austin. Video available on YouTube.
• https://github.com/clojure-emacs/sayid

Guildsman — A TensorFlow library for Clojure. TensorFlow is Google's machine-learning library.

• The Tensors Must Flow — Spoke at Conj 2017 in Baltimore. Video available on YouTube.
• https://github.com/bpiel/guildsman