Vetted Chief Technology Officers in California

Peter Gluck

Screened ReferencesStrong rec.

Principal Software Engineer specializing in scalable, secure multi-platform systems

La Crescenta, CA14y exp

“Engineering leader and former CTO/Disney|ABC engineering manager who built white-label mobile app architecture that supported a branded app and successful exit, and later scaled Disney Channel brand app teams across iOS/Android/web and major OTT platforms. Led kid-safety architecture for DisneyNOW (“Junior mode” with PIN) and partnered with product/legal on COPPA compliance, emphasizing maintainable tech choices and strong execution processes.”

william chen

Screened

Executive game technology leader specializing in product innovation and live-service platforms

Los Angeles, CA27y exp

“Serial entrepreneur with multiple successful exits who has previously raised several rounds and worked with accelerators. Currently building an AI-powered life simulation universe with prompt-based creation and a self-evolving persistent world, backed by completed market research and an MVP in development.”

“LLMOps-focused technical leader who took an LLM use case from prototype to production for a non-technical customer by combining trust-building and structured enablement with a robust AWS/Kubernetes-based MLOps stack. Built observability and rollback mechanisms (Grafana + MLflow) to troubleshoot in real time, and scaled delivery by hiring a 5-person team while partnering with sales to manage expectations and drive adoption across departments.”

“Engineering leader with hands-on Android architecture expertise who has scaled mobile teams at Weedmaps (including forming a Platform team and rolling out MVVM/unit testing) and also co-founded a bootstrapped side business (Sizzle), owning the technical roadmap, hiring strategy (university pipeline + senior remote engineers in Pakistan), and stepping into fundraising when runway became critical.”

“CTO-minded builder seeking to join a startup; previously created an AI-driven platform that abstracted away DevOps and infrastructure for drug discovery researchers. Emphasizes high-leverage, zero-to-one execution with managed cloud/open-source tooling, and a strong reliability/reproducibility mindset validated against existing scientific pipelines.”

UDAY JARAJAPU

Screened

Executive engineering leader specializing in AI-native products and large-scale platforms

Fremont, CA22y exp

“Experienced cross-functional operator with background in AI, edtech, consumer mobile, cloud, and real estate search, including roles at Apple, AWS, and Trulia. Currently building Typerighter, an AI-native writing workspace focused on compliance, authenticity, and human-verifiable content, with a nuanced understanding of institutional requirements and startup/accelerator dynamics.”

“CTO-level leader with deep insurtech and cloud security/SaaS experience who has repeatedly scaled global engineering orgs and delivered high-velocity roadmaps. Most recently led Delos Insurance Solutions to launch new homeowners programs for wildfire-prone regions every 3–4 weeks while meeting DOI/SLA requirements, driving $135M GWP and $250M capacity and reaching cash-flow positive. Also led major scalability re-architecture at CloudPassage (Postgres to Cassandra + Kafka) and built a large Estonia-based engineering hub at Cybercube.”

Daniel Benyamin

Screened

Executive AI and product leader specializing in media, advertising, and data platforms

Los Angeles, CA28y exp

“Serial entrepreneur in marketing and advertising who has founded four companies, most of them venture-backed. Has raised pre-seed and other venture funding multiple times, mentored at Techstars, and brings a strong investor network plus firsthand experience across the VC, accelerator, and launchpad ecosystem.”

“Engineering leader (Director of Development) with hands-on cloud and product experience who builds business-aligned technology roadmaps and scales teams. Delivered an enterprise cloud-migration enabler at UHG by implementing AD authentication and Terraform-based IaC for custom VM images while meeting 90-day InfoSec patch/rotation requirements, and drove a 20% lift in user consumption/retention by designing an interactive branded media portal experience for Sunkist.”

Shady Ashkar

Screened

Executive Technology & Engineering Leader specializing in SaaS, FinTech and HealthTech

Orange County, CA30y exp

“Engineering leader (Octane) who drove business-aligned technology roadmaps and scaled a fully distributed engineering org from 35 to 150 in 9 months using a rigorous ownership model (OARP). Led a greenfield architecture for a new vertical (AWS Lambda/ECS, Python/JS/React) that delivered an MVP in 3 months while cutting per-service cloud OPEX from ~$300+ to ~$20/month, with 15+ years of remote-first leadership experience.”

“Bootstrapped-startup CTO and former founding engineer who has built products end-to-end as a solo developer across web and games. Led Grublify’s Next.js/TypeScript site (Strapi + Shopify), including a blog that reached ~5k monthly visitors and performance work like progressive loading/infinite scroll. Also implemented a resilient USDA nutrition ingestion pipeline with retries, partial-failure handling, and computed nutrient metrics.”

Josh Rhoades

Screened

Executive Technology Leader (CTO) specializing in AI-enabled SaaS and regulated platforms

Los Angeles, CA30y exp

“Senior engineering leader with experience at Disney and BlackLine who drives business-aligned technology roadmaps through deep Product/Engineering partnership (two-in-a-box) and pragmatic prioritization frameworks. Has led major modernization initiatives—private-to-public cloud migration to GCP with multi-cloud evolution, data-layer performance improvements (Mongo/Redis, caching/query optimization), and tooling upgrades (VSS to GitHub)—while scaling teams with strong quality and accountability culture.”