Tech Lead · Entrepreneur · Triathlete · Ecuador

Daniel Hidalgo — Tech Lead & Senior Software Engineer Architecture that serves the business,
not the other way around.

8+ years in software development, building scalable backends and products with TypeScript, NestJS, React and AWS. Today I lead five products at Cencosud and I'm a partner at Arupo. I own what I build end to end: architecture, integrations, deployments and how it behaves in production.

Let's work together CV (EN) CV (ES)
Illustrated portrait of Daniel Hidalgo, Tech Lead
Currently Tech Lead at CencosudEntrepreneur & partner at ArupoBuilding with AI agents every dayTraining for my next triathlonMeasuring engineering impact
Years in software development
8+
Strategic products led as Tech Lead
5
Users on a SaaS platform on AWS
~300

Companies I've worked with

Principles

Opinionated, on purpose.

Four convictions I bring to every team and every codebase I work on.

  1. Architecture serves the business.

    I like DDD, hexagonal architecture and distributed systems, but I don't add complexity the product doesn't need. The best architecture is the one that lets the product evolve, stay maintainable and scale sustainably.

  2. Ownership doesn't end at the merge.

    An engineer doesn't just ship features. They own the quality, the deploys, the observability and how their services behave in production.

  3. Quality and speed are not enemies.

    Clear standards, automated tests and reliable pipelines. Technical debt doesn't disappear when you ignore it; sooner or later it slows the whole team down.

  4. Impact you can measure.

    Not tickets, not commits. I'd rather look at stability, operational efficiency, delivery time and the value users actually get.

Experience

From the architecture diagram to the production incident.

What I own as Tech Lead

  • Architecture
  • Integrations
  • Legacy modernization
  • Code quality
  • Deployments
  • Production incidents

I've spent 8+ years in software development and grown into technical leadership. I work across the whole stack in TypeScript, but what I care about most is how a system holds up once it's in production.

As a Tech Lead I've been responsible for five strategic products, working with multidisciplinary teams on architecture, integrations, legacy modernization, code quality, deployments and production incidents.

I've also helped build and operate SaaS platforms on AWS, including one serving around 300 users.

Impact

Four fronts I've worked on as Tech Lead.

The challenge, what I did about it, and what changed. Putting hard numbers on each one is exactly what I'm working on next.

  1. Architecture

    Challenge
    Legacy systems with tight coupling that were hard to maintain.
    Approach
    Separated responsibilities and reshaped the architecture of the services.
    Outcome
    Services that are easier to evolve, with lower risk on every change.

  2. Stability

    Challenge
    Production incidents that were hard to diagnose.
    Approach
    Better error handling, observability and technical coordination during incidents.
    Outcome
    Incidents that are easier to trace and to resolve.

  3. Quality & delivery

    Challenge
    Many services to maintain, with a constant risk of regressions.
    Approach
    Automation, testing, code reviews and CI/CD as the team standard.
    Outcome
    A standardized way of building, and releases shipped with more confidence.

  4. Infrastructure

    Challenge
    A SaaS platform on AWS balancing availability, complexity and cost.
    Approach
    Managed services, plus evaluating where its operation could be optimized.
    Outcome
    Less infrastructure to run by hand, and a clear map of where to optimize next.

AI-assisted engineering

AI is a tool I direct, not a replacement for judgment.

I'm passionate about building software, and AI changed how I do it. Not as autocomplete, but as a workflow I designed and run on my own machine every day: the agents execute, I keep the decisions, the context and the quality bar.

What it changed for me as a Tech Lead

Less time typing, more time on design, reviews and unblocking the team. The skill that matters now is knowing what to ask, and recognizing when the answer is wrong. That only comes from fundamentals.

Read how I use AI in my workflow

Journey

From junior engineer to Tech Lead.

Banks, retail, startups and a company of my own: each step added a layer, from infrastructure to architecture to leading teams. Today that layer is AI, and the job is making it work for the team without lowering the bar.

  1. 2025 — Present Current

    Tech Lead

    Cencosud

    Promoted to lead five core products: two communication platforms (including the migration off a legacy system), the “Mis Compras” platform, a claims management system and a cancellation management tool. Architecture guidelines, code quality, critical deployments, incidents and postmortems.

    • Technical leadership
    • Legacy migration
    • Distributed systems
  2. 2021 — 2025

    Senior Software Engineer

    Acid Labs · external team for Cencosud

    Led a development team building scalable, high-performance web solutions for Cencosud in Chile.

    • React
    • Redux
    • NestJS
    • Node.js
    • MongoDB
  3. 2019 — 2022

    Software Engineer → Lead Software Engineer

    Kin Analytics

    Grew from full-stack engineer (React, Angular, Vue, Node.js, Python) to leading the team that delivered the solutions, running Scrum and Kanban.

    • Full-stack
    • Team lead
    • Agile
  4. 2017 — 2023

    Founder

    DevBrain

    Founded and ran my own software consultancy in Quito, alongside my engineering roles.

    • Entrepreneurship
    • Consulting
  5. 2016 — 2019

    Software Engineer → Consultant

    Easysoft Ecuador & freelance

    Payment solutions in .NET for banks such as Banco Pichincha and BanEcuador. On the side: an Angular front end for Liberty Seguros, a data-cleansing app for DirecTV and React/React Native work at Chariot Solutions.

    • .NET
    • Payments
    • Angular
    • Docker
  6. 2014 — 2016

    Junior Engineer

    Ministerio de Finanzas del Ecuador

    Where it started: web development, infrastructure, perimeter network security and technical support.

    • Web
    • Infrastructure
    • Networking

Education Software Engineering · Universidad Tecnológica Equinoccial (2012 — 2018)

Beyond the title

Tech Lead, entrepreneur and amateur triathlete.

A little more of who I am when I'm not in a pull request.

By day

Tech Lead at Cencosud

Leading five strategic products and the team behind them, from architecture decisions to critical deployments and postmortems.

Building

Entrepreneur & partner at Arupo

Building a company as a partner, applying the same engineering principles from the business side of the table.

Swim · Bike · Run

Amateur triathlete

Training for triathlon keeps me disciplined. Like engineering, it rewards consistency and measured progress over bursts of effort.

Stack

The tools I reach for to build things that scale.

Backend

  • NestJS
  • Node.js
  • Microservices
  • REST & event-driven

Frontend

  • React
  • Next.js
  • TypeScript
  • Component systems

Cloud & Infra

  • AWS EKS
  • Redis
  • SQS / SNS
  • Containers & CI

Practices

  • DDD & hexagonal architecture
  • System design
  • Observability
  • Team leadership

AI workflow

  • Claude & coding agents
  • Pi + Gentle AI harness
  • Engram persistent memory
  • Spec-driven development

Now

Making engineering impact verifiable.

My next focus is measuring technical impact: performance, reliability, infrastructure cost and delivery efficiency. I want engineering decisions to be backed by results anyone can verify.

What's a /now page?

Writing

Notes on architecture, backend systems & scale.

All posts

Contact

Let's build something that holds up in production.

A product that needs to scale, a legacy system to modernize, or a team ready to own production? I'm one message away.

hrdi3191@gmail.com