I don't sell systems. I ask what your business actually does, then build exactly the software it needs — with AI multiplying what a solo engineer can ship. Twenty years of experience, delivered in days, not months. Your first version is free, so you can see the work before you commit a dollar.
Most businesses I talk to have already tried two or three things. Maybe it was Odoo, or NetSuite, or SAP Business One, or Zoho, or QuickBooks stretched well past what it was meant to do. Some of it works. Some of it almost works. And there's this one part — the part that really runs your operation — where every system falls short in the same frustrating way.
Usually it's not that the software is bad. It's that your business doesn't fit the template, and the customization path looks painful: the vendor wants $80,000 and six months, or a consultant quotes you something impossible to verify, or the plugin you need was written in 2018 and hasn't been updated since.
So the gap lives in spreadsheets. In macros. In a tool somebody built on a weekend and never touched again. In tribal knowledge that lives in one person's head. It works, mostly. Until it doesn't.
We talk about how your business actually runs — not the slide-deck version, the real one. What breaks. What takes too long. Who does the weird workarounds.
One to two weeks of my time. Real software, running on a staging environment your team can touch. Not a prototype, not a mockup — the actual first slice of what you'd use every day.
If it works for you, we scope phase two and keep shipping — weekly demos, fixed prices, honest pace. If it's not a fit, you keep the software I built, we shake hands, and we part as friends.
Not a sales tactic with fine print. The first build is genuinely free — up to about forty hours of my work on a well-defined problem. That's how I prove it's worth hiring me without asking you to trust me first.
When we're done, I hand over everything: code, documentation, access. Then I train your team on how to modify it using AI — the same tools I use daily. Most small changes that used to require calling a developer, your people can now handle in minutes. You're not locked into me.
The free first version isn't charity — it's how I find long-term clients. Real revenue comes from the months and years after, when we're shipping features, integrating new systems, and keeping your software aligned with the business as it grows. But you choose to come back, every time. It's never a trap.
Tools vary with the project — I pick what fits your situation, your team, and what you already have. Nothing exotic, nothing chosen for fashion. Everything you can hire someone else to maintain if you ever need to.
Independent engineer building custom software with AI as a force multiplier. Twenty years of the unglamorous work that makes businesses actually run.
I've been writing production software since 2004. Back-office tools, ERPs, integrations, internal web and mobile apps, data pipelines. The systems your team touches every Monday morning — that kind of work.
What changed in the last two years is AI. Used the right way, it lets a solo engineer ship at the pace of an agency — and then some. I use it daily in my work: for code, for business analysis, for documentation, for the thinking-through that used to take whole afternoons. That's why days now do what months used to.
Based in Chicago. Working worldwide — US, EU, and Asia timezones. Direct contracts, or through a US entity, or via Upwork — whichever suits your legal setup.
Yes. Up to about forty hours of my work, on one well-defined problem. Not a sales tactic — it's how I prove the quality without asking you to trust me first. If we continue, we do it on paid phases. If we don't, you keep what I built and we part as friends.
You're welcome to. That's the point of the offer. I'd rather have you leave with something useful than waste both our time on a bad fit. Just be honest about it — my time is finite and I'd rather spend it with people who are actually considering continuing.
Honest answer: in my own work, yes. AI used well — for code, analysis, documentation, the thinking-through — has genuinely changed the math of what a solo engineer can ship in a day. Whether it lands at exactly ten times faster for your specific project, I won't know until we scope it. But agencies quoting six months for what I do in three weeks is now normal, not a surprise.
Depends on what we're building — every engagement is scoped individually. The honest way to find out: we have a thirty-minute call, I build your first version free, and if we continue, I write you a scope document with a fixed price before any paid work starts. You know what you're paying before you commit to anything. No surprise invoices, no hourly billing.
Yes — that's a core part of what I deliver. When the project wraps, I train the people who'll actually use it on how to make small changes themselves, using AI the same way I do. Adding a field, adjusting a report, tweaking a workflow — things that used to require a developer call can now be done in minutes by whoever runs that process. You're not dependent on me. You come back if you want to, not because you have to.
Honestly, this is often the better answer. A lot of my work is customization — building the one module Odoo or NetSuite or SAP can't, or wiring together the stack you already have. Full replacement is a last resort, not a first.
Fair concern, and the honest answer is — you have a contract, a scope in writing, a code repository you own from day one, documentation in plain language, and a deployment that runs on your infrastructure. If anything happened to me tomorrow, you'd still have the system and a clear way forward. That's structural, not a promise.
Yes. Standard mutual NDA before we discuss anything sensitive.
Yes. I'm based in Chicago and work across US, EU, and Asian timezones. Clients on three continents so far. Contracts can be direct, through a US entity, or via a platform like Upwork — whichever suits your legal setup best.
First call this week. Free first version typically starts within one to two weeks, depending on current bookings. If something is truly urgent, ask — sometimes there's slack.
Things I don't do: 3D games, casino and gambling platforms, adult content, adversarial web scraping, and SEO spam tooling. Everything else — most real business software — is on the table.
No hidden catch, no fine print, no automatic billing after the first version. You see the work, you decide.
Every paid phase has a scope and a price agreed in writing. You know what you're paying. No hourly surprises.
You see progress continuously — not a big reveal at the end. Every week, something new is in staging for your team to try.
From day one, everything I build is yours. Your repository. Your hosting. Your credentials. No SaaS dependency on me.
Every engagement is documented well enough that another engineer could take it over. No tribal knowledge, no magic, no lock-in.
I train the people who'll actually use the system on how to make changes using AI — the same way I do. Small tweaks, new fields, tweaked reports — they won't need to call me back for any of it.
If your idea is a bad idea, I'll say so. If something is harder than it looks, I'll say so. If it's simpler — same. You're hiring judgment, not just hands.
Book a thirty-minute call this week. Tell me what your business actually does — the real version, not the slide deck. I'll tell you honestly whether I'm the right fit. If I am, we skip the six-month sales cycle and I start building.