What I do
Fractional and advisory CTO, software architect, and developer with 30 years of experience, working with companies in the US and Europe. I take part-time operating roles (roadmap, architecture, building and leading engineering teams) and advisory engagements (architecture reviews, technical due diligence) — and I stay hands-on across the stack while doing it.
What that means in practice: .NET applications and services, data architecture and operations on PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB and SQL Server, infrastructure as code with Terraform, Kubernetes on AWS and Azure, event streaming with Kafka, and mass video processing and delivery at scale — plus Python and Go where the stack calls for it. Long-term engagements in fintech, crypto compliance, banking, telecom, and sports media.
Architecture
System, data, and cloud architecture for products that have to scale: event-driven platforms, data-heavy systems, video processing and delivery pipelines.
Engineering leadership
Fractional CTO: technology roadmap, planning and budgeting, building and mentoring engineering teams, DevOps and CI/CD practice. Advisory: architecture reviews and technical due diligence.
Hands-on delivery
I still write production code across the stack: .NET services, data modeling and operations on PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB and SQL Server, Terraform, Kubernetes (EKS/AKS), Kafka, FFmpeg — plus Python and Go where the stack calls for it.
Current engagements
Fractional CTO & Head of Development
ChainComply · contract
ChainComply is a crypto-compliance platform: a decision layer for Enhanced Due Diligence that consolidates exchange, wallet, and DeFi data into Source-of-Wealth reports, helping banks, VASPs, and wealth managers meet MiCA and EBA requirements. I lead engineering end to end — roadmap, architecture, delivery, and the AWS/Kubernetes platform — and stay hands-on in .NET.
- .NET
- AWS (EKS, EC2, S3, RDS, Athena)
- Kubernetes
- Docker
- MongoDB
- PostgreSQL
- MySQL
- ELK
Staff Software Engineer
Confidential client (NDA) · contract
Long-term engagement with a confidential client operating a large-scale video platform: the video ingest and transcoding pipeline, the serving and delivery layer, and the underlying infrastructure and data layers.
- .NET
- FFmpeg
- Kafka
- AWS (EKS, S3, CloudFront)
- Terraform
- Akamai
- Kubernetes
- MongoDB
- MySQL
Background
- 2015 – 2022Software Architect, KlearArchitecture of Bulgaria's first peer-to-peer lending platform, built entirely on Microsoft Azure.
- 2003 – 2015CTO, Data Solutions LtdRan engineering at a software consultancy delivering bespoke systems to the financial, telecom, and trade sectors.
- 1994 – 2003Team lead and developer roles in bankingBank information systems at United Bulgarian Bank, UniCredit Bulbank, and Infointegra; started as a developer at ITI Soft.
- 1989 – 1994MSc Computer EngineeringUniversity of Ruse.
Sectors & stack
- Fintech
- Crypto compliance
- Banking
- Telecom
- Sports media
- .NET
- AWS
- Azure
- Kubernetes
- Terraform
- Docker
- CI/CD
- Kafka
- FFmpeg
- CloudFront / Akamai
- MongoDB
- PostgreSQL
- MySQL
- MS SQL Server
- ELK
- Python
- Go
Languages: Bulgarian (native), English (C2), Russian (C1).
I take on a small number of fractional and advisory engagements at a time — operating CTO roles, architecture reviews, technical due diligence, or hands-on platform work. US and EU clients, remote, with daily US-morning overlap.
Get in touchEmail: hello [at] nstanev [dot] com