Senior software engineer building backend systems, cloud infrastructure and developer platforms.

Nairobi, Kenya. Open to selected engineering work and technical consulting. See the workGet in touch

John is a software engineer who specializes in backend systems, cloud infrastructure, APIs, databases and developer tooling.

He builds reliable systems for organizations that need software to keep working under real-world infrastructure constraints.

Distributed systemsBackend architectureCloud infrastructureDeveloper platformsAPI designDatabasesSystem reliabilityAutomation

Selected work

Open a project. Atlas and FlowPay include an interactive walkthrough.

Seven years, three teams

Senior Software Engineer

Nexa Systems, Nairobi. 2023 to present.

Responsibilities

  • Design backend services and APIs
  • Develop cloud-ready application infrastructure
  • Improve database performance
  • Build deployment automation
  • Diagnose production reliability problems
  • Work with product and frontend teams

Achievements

  • Led the modernization of several legacy backend services
  • Reduced deployment friction with automated CI/CD workflows
  • Introduced containerized development environments
  • Helped establish reusable API architecture patterns

Software Engineer

Orbit Digital Labs, Nairobi. 2020 to 2023.

Responsibilities

  • Built backend APIs and internal tools
  • Worked with relational and document databases
  • Supported production deployments
  • Worked with designers and frontend engineers

Achievements

  • Delivered multiple production APIs
  • Helped migrate legacy services toward containers
  • Built internal tooling that cut repetitive deployment tasks

Software Engineering Intern

Kinetic Technologies, Nairobi. 2019 to 2020.

Responsibilities

  • Supported application development
  • Wrote automated tests
  • Assisted with database maintenance
  • Debugged issues and documented processes

The stack I work in

Languages

  • C
  • C++
  • Python
  • JavaScript
  • TypeScript
  • Java
  • SQL

Backend

  • Node.js
  • Express
  • REST APIs
  • Authentication
  • Background processing

Databases

  • PostgreSQL
  • MySQL
  • MongoDB
  • Redis

Infrastructure

  • Linux
  • Docker
  • Nginx
  • Cloudflare
  • GitHub Actions

Cloud

  • AWS
  • Firebase
  • CI/CD
  • Containerized deployments

Engineering

  • Distributed systems
  • System architecture
  • Performance optimization
  • Networking
  • Reliability engineering

Credentials

Achievements

  • Engineering Excellence AwardNexa Systems
    2025
  • SpeakerEast Africa Developer Conference
    2025
  • MentorNairobi Developer Community
  • Technical LeadInternal Platform Modernization Initiative

Education

  • BSc Computer ScienceUniversity of Nairobi
    2015 to 2019

Certifications

  • AWS Certified Developer, Associate
    2025
  • Docker Certified Associate
    2024
  • Linux Foundation Certified System Administrator
    2024
  • Google Cloud Associate Cloud Engineer
    2023

Backend engineering

Design and implementation of production backend systems.

API development

Reliable APIs and integrations for modern applications.

Cloud infrastructure

Containerization, deployment automation and infrastructure architecture.

Technical consulting

Architecture reviews, infrastructure analysis and engineering strategy.

Writing

2025

Designing APIs for Unreliable Networks

Designing resilient API systems.

2024

Containers Without the Complexity

Practical containerized application deployments.

2024

Building Reliable Background Workers

Queues, retries and background processing.

Let’s build something that stays up.

If you have a real backend, cloud or platform problem, John would like to hear about it.

john.doe@example.com
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