Brandon Casci

Somerville, MA - Portland, ME
https://www.brandoncasci.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandoncasci/

Summary

I help startups, small teams, and mission-driven organizations transform ambitious ideas into scalable, practical solutions. I thrive at the intersection of business and technology, turning concepts into reality.

Skills

Ruby, SQL, JavaScript, Rails, Elixir, Python, Phoenix, APIs, AWS, Docker, OpenAI, CI/CD, SaaS, A/B Testing, Twilio

Integrations, Architecture, Self-Direction, Collaboration, Leadership
Problem-Solving, Innovation, Cross-functional Teamwork, Product Led Growth (PLG), Remote Work

Experience

04/2024 - Present Software Engineering Consultant, Self

• Drive end-to-end development of scalable, high-impact software solutions tailored to client needs.
• Architect and implement full-stack applications with modern frameworks, such as Ruby on Rails and Stimulus.js.
• Refactor legacy systems to streamline performance, reduce technical debt, and improve maintainability.
• Train AI coding assistants to deliver optimized solutions, streamlined workflows and enhanced team productivity.

Voluntary Learning Sabbatical, Self
09/2023 - 04/2024

• Began a voluntary sabbatical from Bonterra to pursue focused studies in artificial intelligence.
• Achieved 300 hours of coursework and experimentation in LLM, ML, and Python technologies during voluntary self-improvement sabbatical.
• Orchestrated the soft launch of CBO Flow, a project aimed at optimizing operations for community-based organizations.

Lead Growth Engineer, Bonterra
01/2023 - 08/2023

• Led the transition from a Sales Led model to a Product Led Growth strategy, improving operational efficiency. Enhanced a SaaS codebase by refactoring legacy code and addressing limitations within the AWS architecture, improving productivity.
• A/B tested signup flows with experimentation methodologies, optimizing the customer journey and increasing conversion rates.
• Actively participated in the implementation of a self-service signup process for products, replacing the conventional sales-driven model. Resulted in significant reductions in onboarding times and notably increased customer engagement, facilitating a smoother user experience.
• Provided technical leadership through hands-on involvement in code reviews, mentorship, and fostering team synergy across departments.
• Collaborated closely with marketing, sales, and accounts payable teams, fostering an integrated work culture.
• Implemented maintainable solutions inspired by cross-function team insight using a tech stack consisting of Ruby, Ruby on Rails, AWS, JavaScript, third-party APIs, PostgreSQL, and other technologies. These solutions optimized the customer journey, supporting the shift towards a more customer-centric approach.
• Gained expertise in deploying scalable solutions for Enterprise Software customers, supporting a user base of 20K customers for fundraising outreach to millions of donors.

Senior Software Engineer, Bonterra
04/2022 - 12/2022

• Launched and successfully transitioned an auction product from beta to general availability, raising over $1M for non-profit customers post-launch.
• Architected and implemented a multi-format auction messaging system (email and text messages/SMS via Twilio) ensuring timely and accurate communication with bidders.
• Collaborated closely with project management and UI/UX leads, refining feature requirements within an AGILE framework for effective development cycles.
• Resolved bugs of application code, ensuring operational efficiency and customer satisfaction.
• Performed peer-code reviews to maintain product quality standards before market release.
• Architected maintainable solutions using Ruby, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, AWS, PostgreSQL, and other tools, handling asynchronous jobs and messaging between systems, while focusing on best practices.
• Established coding standards in collaboration with developers, ensuring consistency and high-quality code.
• Recognized with a promotion to Lead Growth Engineer for contributions and achievements, demonstrating commitment and expertise.

Contract Software Engineer, Bonterra
02/2022 - 04/2022

• Developed features for an auction product, bringing the product towards beta release.
• Refactored code, correcting problematic areas within the codebase to optimize system performance and improving code maintainability.
• Amended onboarding documentation and streamlined environmental setup scripts, ensuring smoother onboarding of future developers.
• Architected and implemented maintainable solutions with Ruby, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, PostgreSQL, and other technologies, according to best practices.

Principal Software Developer, CTO & Co-founder, bosWell, Inc.
07/2018 - 10/2022

• Stabilized the company upon joining by resolving technical issues that prevented compliance with pre-existing grant requirements, thereby solidifying my position as a co-founder.
• Led the development of two subsequent SaaS product generations, emphasizing innovation and enhancing customer experience through continuous collaboration with internal and external stakeholders. This strategic input resulted in product maturation and secured $1M in angel and grant funding.
• Defined roadmaps for complex projects across teams and functions.
• Drove testing and experimentation that produced low cost organic growth.
• Conducted candidate interviews, contributing to the hiring process to identify the best software engineers for our team.
• Contributed to and executed components of the marketing strategy, fostering organic discovery and market visibility.
• Evaluated and selected optimal vendors, facilitating efficient operations and quick iterations by delegating problem-solving outside our core domain.
• Integrated our systems with healthcare providers, establishing HIPAA-compliant environments, and responded to security assessments, enabling the company to expand its pilot program with healthcare providers.
• Implemented solutions that enabled community-based organizations to track care provided to hundreds of thousands of clients, enhancing the overall client experience. This provided data-driven insights for these organizations, enabling a better understanding of demand, demographics, and streamlined reporting to comply with grant funding guidelines.
• Implemented solutions that enabled community-based organizations to track care provided to hundreds of thousands of clients, enhancing client experience and offering valuable data insights to understand demand, demographics, and facilitate streamlined reporting for grant funding compliance.
• Implemented tech solutions using Ruby, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, Cloud Computing, Docker, PostgreSQL, and other tools, incorporating distributed systems and asynchronous processes. Balanced the delivery of scalable, maintainable code with a rapid go-to-market strategies.

Contract Software Engineer, Concierge Live
08/2017 - 09/2018

• Recognized for previous contributions and valued for delivering tangible results, prompting an invitation to return. My work significantly impacted customer satisfaction, successful sales closures, and overall operational effectiveness.
• Played a crucial role in debugging code and conducting code reviews, ensuring product quality and performance.
• Implemented a an Elixir-based integration between the in-house ticket management system and Ticketmaster. This innovative integration enabled the purchase of event tickets within ConciergeLive and facilitated mobile ticket transfers to attendees. The Elixir implementations adhered to best practices, emphasizing context boundaries and utilized Phoenix for enhanced maintainability.
• Collaborated with internal and external stakeholders, working cross-functionally to ensure the successful delivery of agreed-upon solutions.
• Contributed to feature enhancements in the core ticket management product. Frequently working within a tech stack of Ruby, Ruby on Rails, distributed systems, PostgreSQL, JavaScript, Docker, and other supplementary technologies to drive continuous improvements and innovation.

Contract Software Engineer, T2 Modus
11/2016 - 01/2017

• Spearheaded stabilization efforts for product readiness, facilitating its transition to general availability, ensuring a seamless release.
• Resolved bugs within the reporting system, offering automobile dealerships insights into sales prospects’ statuses and deal flow progressions, optimizing sales strategies.
• Implemented outreach channels through a data-driven approach, proactively contacting previous buyers during opportune moments, triggering workflows that facilitated the closing of deals, and increased sales potential.
• Collaborated cross-functionally with stakeholders in data science, sales, and management to execute tasks efficiently, ensuring alignment with project objectives.
• Implemented maintainable and best practice solutions with Ruby, Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, MySQL, JavaScript, Angular, and other supplementary technologies. ensuring a high-quality go-to-market strategy.

Senior Software Engineer, Concierge Live
05/2015 - 02/2017

• Implemented features pivotal in acquiring and retaining major corporate customers such as Barclays, AT&T, and Citrix. These clients relied on our platform for managing event tickets for corporate entertainment purposes, with some annual contracts exceeding $50K.
• Addressed occasional performance issues, ensuring a high-quality customer experience and service level.
• Assisted customers with data migrations from competitor platforms, resulting in increased company revenue and enhanced customer satisfaction.
• Facilitated security assessments, instrumental in closing deals and driving increased revenue for the company.
• Collaborated cross-functionally with internal stakeholders, ensuring cohesive operations and successful project execution.
• Implemented reliable solutions according to best practices using Ruby, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, PostgreSQL, integrated third-party API integrations, and employed strategies like backgroundprocessing to facilitate high-quality customer experiences in production.

Contract Software Engineer, Par8o
09/2014 - 04/2015

• Contributed features and fixed to a platform used by healthcare providers to facilitate the secure and seamless transfer of medical records and patient information between various healthcare entities, streamlining the process for healthcare providers and enhancing patient care.
• Resolved bugs to ensure the stability and reliability of the platform, that maintained HIPAA, SOC2 and other compliances for data security and privacy.
• Worked closely with stakeholders in the healthcare domain to understand needs and compliance requirements, delivering solutions aligned with project objectives.
• Employed a tech stack including Ruby, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, Angular, postgres and other technologies, adhering to best practices in order to deliver high quality solutions into production.

Career Break, Self
03/2014 - 08/2014

Enjoyed life and evaluated next steps after successfully exiting Loudcaster and LoudCity.

Principal Software Developer & Founder, LoudCity
11/2005 - 02/2014

• Architected and implemented a robust system ensuring the collection of performance metrics for independent online music radio broadcasters to comply with copyright laws, facilitating accurate music royalty calculations and legal operations.
• Provided the service via a SaaS model, serving 750 customers and generating a monthly revenue stream of $25K.
• Introduced referral marketing strategies within synergistic communities and vendor networks, fostering organic growth without incurring marketing costs.
• Actively lobbied the United States Congress in person and submitted written testimony during hearings to extend the Small Webcaster Settlement Act. Successfully achieving an extension provided essential financial stability for small broadcasters to continue their operations.
• Nurtured enduring customer relationships that yielded consistent, long-term revenue streams.
• Engineered a high-performance, scalable system capable of processing real-time statistics and metadata from numerous broadcasting endpoints several times per minute. Managed data through an advanced workflow, attributing performances to copyright holders and conducting geographic IP address lookups for listener information. This ensured industry and legal compliance by logging hundreds of millions of performances annually.
• Leveraged technologies including Ruby, Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, and Linux in a distributed, scalable architecture, utilizing queuing mechanisms and asynchronous processing to optimize system performance.
• Successfully orchestrated the sale of the venture to a competitor in a private transaction.

Principal Software Developer & Founder, Loudcaster 12/2009 - 10/2012

• Architected and implemented a live broadcast streaming system, empowering individuals to create and manage radio stations through live streaming or continuous broadcasts using remote feed relays or content uploads to our servers.
• Operated as a SaaS platform, serving 250 broadcast customers and accommodating thousands of listeners, yielding a revenue stream of $6,500 per month.
• Engaged in the Boston Techstars 2010 business acceleration program, enriching my expertise in resource optimization and efficient operations.
• Executed advanced integrations among distributed systems and open-source technologies using Ruby and Linux shell scripting. These integrations facilitated audio transcoding, inter-process communication, and automated resource provisioning for customer management, encompassing sign-ups, upgrades, downgrades, and cancellations.
• Leveraged a tech stack comprising Ruby, Ruby on Rails, PostgreSQL, queuing, asynchronous processing, Linux, shell scripting, and push technologies, ensuring the delivery of reliable and scalable solutions while maintaining an unwavering commitment to product quality and reliability.

Various Software Engineering Roles, Various Companies
10/1996 - 10/2005

See LinkedIn for more details.

Miscellaneous Experience

Techstars Boston 2010
RailsBridge Boston Assistant
MassChallenge 2010

Recommendations

Brandon is the kind of engineer that is a multiplier. He not only brings a large skill set, and a dedicated work ethic, he also works hard to make the entire team around him better.

He has a strong feel for what makes more maintainable code, and can lead others to see his vision.

He also pushes and prods to make any solution better. Even the most elegantly implemented solution won’t deliver results if it solves the wrong problem. Having run his own business, he understands the importance of solving the most important problem first.

Thomas Hoen
Senior VP of Product Engineering
Bonterra

Brandon is an engineer’s engineer! His technical acumen helped our team write better, product-focused
code and his entrepreneurial savvy helped us deliver smarter features, faster. He’s really smart and generous with knowledge. I hope we get another chance to work together!

Mike Subelsky
Consulting Software Architect

Brandon and I were paired as the core members of the Growth team at Bonterra, and we worked together
for a year on a series of pioneering projects. This was such a lucky break, because in Brandon I had a true partner in finding innovative, out-of-the-box solutions to problems that were all in a completely new area for the company, with no map, and no pre-existing norms to follow. His willingness to look at a challenge with an open mind and find well-designed ways to take pieces apart and put them back together in smart, efficient, and future-proof ways that will help us scale was exactly what we needed in a growth engineer, and his entrepreneurial spirit made for a fantastic team comradery.

Shannon Peavey
Principal Product Lead
Bonterra

Education

1995 - AAS, Comomuter Networking; Raritan Valley Community College
2023 - Course, Machine Learning Specialization - Deeplearning.ai