Gawaine O'Gilvie
Senior Software Engineer
Building AI-powered products and scalable backend systems.
- →Led Kubernetes migration → 40% faster deployments
- →Built internal platforms used by engineering teams at scale
- →Developed AI-powered applications (LLMs, RAG pipelines, vision-language models)
Senior Software Engineer with 10+ years of experience building scalable backend systems and AI-powered applications. Experienced in Python, TypeScript, AWS, and machine learning systems, with a track record of improving developer velocity and shipping production-grade software.
AI & Machine Learning Projects
Problem
Teams waste hours manually reviewing and extracting insights from large document sets with no structured traceability
Solution
Built an AI-powered document analysis system that ingests PDFs/Markdown/HTML, performs retrieval + reasoning via a RAG pipeline, and returns structured outputs with full citation tracking
Impact
Semantic search with pgvector enables instant retrieval across thousands of documents with source traceability
Problem
Debugging production incidents required hours of manual log parsing to identify root causes
Solution
Built a full-stack app (Next.js + FastAPI) that analyzes production logs using OpenAI GPT-4 to identify errors, cluster patterns, and surface root causes with actionable remediation steps
Impact
85% reduction in debugging time for production incidents and CI/CD failures
PR AI Assistant
GitHub →Problem
Code reviews created bottlenecks, delaying PRs and missing subtle behavior changes or risks
Solution
Built a GitHub Actions bot that automatically reviews pull requests using OpenAI GPT-4, analyzing git diffs and providing structured summaries with behavior changes, risks, and validation steps
Impact
Automated intelligent code reviews on every PR, catching risks before human review
Core Engineering Projects
Developer Platform Tooling
Problem
Engineers lacked standardized workflows for testing and deployment across distributed services
Solution
Built internal tooling to streamline CI/CD, contract validation, and deployment workflows for cloud services
Impact
Reduced deployment time by 40% and eliminated 85% of contract violations across 10+ microservices
Enterprise Inventory Management Platform
Problem
Client needed a scalable system for managing inventory with QR scanning, media uploads, and multi-role access control
Solution
Delivered 25+ user stories including authentication, QR code scanning, admin console, and media upload functionality on a modern React/TypeScript stack
Impact
Full platform delivered on time with role-based access, real-time updates, and print-optimized QR labels
Experience
Freelance Consulting
Senior Full-Stack Engineer & Technical Consultant
2025 - Present
- •Built an AI-powered log analyzer using OpenAI GPT-4, reducing client debugging time by 85% for production incidents
- •Architected a document intelligence platform with FastAPI, PostgreSQL, and pgvector for AI-powered document analysis using a RAG pipeline
- •Delivered 25+ user stories for an enterprise inventory management platform, including authentication, QR scanning, media upload, and admin console
- •Led frontend modernization projects, migrating legacy codebases to React/TypeScript with comprehensive type safety and API alignment
- •Designed and deployed secure multi-tenant authentication systems using HTTP-only cookies, JWT tokens, and role-based access control
- •Built contract validation systems to ensure reliability across distributed services, reducing production API incidents by 60%
Sonos, Inc.
Senior Software Engineer (Cloud Team)
2017 - 2025
- •Migrated 10+ applications to AWS EKS, reducing infrastructure costs by 40% through optimized containerization and resource allocation
- •Built Lambda/S3 data pipelines processing millions of events with robust error handling and batch processing for reliable data ingestion
- •Developed automation systems that reduced Kubernetes migration time by 80% and streamlined daily deployments for cloud services
- •Built developer productivity platforms using React and TypeScript, increasing engineering team satisfaction by 30%
- •Mentored junior engineers on TypeScript best practices, AWS architecture patterns, and Kubernetes deployment strategies
Nuance Communications
Software Engineer
2014 - 2017
- •Engineered real-time WebSocket services in Python (Flask, Bottle) handling high-throughput voice recognition traffic in production
- •Built and maintained microservices and RESTful APIs supporting speech and analytics workflows across internal and external systems
- •Developed monitoring dashboards that improved incident response time by 40% with real-time visibility into system health
- •Collaborated with data scientists to optimize speech recognition models and improve accuracy metrics
Technical Skills
Languages
Backend & Systems
AI / ML
Cloud & Infrastructure
Frontend
Databases & Observability
Education
Master of Science, Data Science
University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX
- • Advanced coursework in Machine Learning, Statistical Analysis, and Data Engineering
- • Specialization in predictive modeling and big data analytics
Bachelor of Science, Computer Engineering
Northeastern University
Boston, MA
- • Focus on Software Engineering and Systems Architecture
- • Coursework: Data Structures, Algorithms, Embedded Systems, Computer Networks
Work With Me
I help teams build and ship faster. Available for contract and consulting engagements.
- →Build AI-powered applications (LLMs, RAG pipelines, intelligent automation)
- →Design scalable backend systems and cloud infrastructure
- →Improve developer velocity, CI/CD, and platform tooling
Contact
Available for full-time roles and contract / consulting work • Open to remote or hybrid
Outside of Engineering
🥊 Muay Thai — discipline and consistency
🍳 Cooking — experimentation and iteration
🎵 Vinyl — appreciation for craft and detail