Darren Reed

Versatile Engineer & Homelabber

Shipping reliable, performant systems with data-backed user impact, grounded in teaching what I know and learning from others.

Skills
Node.js TypeScript JavaScript Express / Fastify React NestJS Microservices AWS Kubernetes Docker MongoDB PostgreSQL MySQL
Experience
  1. Reconnect

    Sep 2025 – Present
    Node.jsNestJSTypeScriptMicroservicesAWSMySQLPostgreSQLPHP
    Staff Software Engineer (Sep 2025 – Present)
    • Architected a data ingestion pipeline to drastically improve reliability and alert users and support staff of data quality issues.
    • Established an engineering knowledgebase to document processes and procedures that existed only in the minds of long-time engineers.
    • Implemented several services to break apart a legacy PHP monolith, demonstrating server-side sorting and searching at scale.
    Software Engineer (Apr 2021 – Jan 2023; Aug 2023 – Sep 2024)
  2. Greenlight Financial Technologies

    Apr 2021 – Sep 2024
    Node.jsTypeScriptMicroservicesAWSRedisgRPCKubernetesDockerMySQL
    Tech Lead, Investment Team (Apr 2021 – Jan 2023; Aug 2023 – Sep 2024)
    • Led and mentored a team of 6 software engineers.
    • Reduced non-actionable pages by 80%, redirecting focus toward feature development.
    • Cut incidents from 6 per quarter to 4 per year through reliable architecture and code quality.
    • Improved search performance ~95% (300ms to 15ms; p99 600ms to 20ms).
    Senior Software Engineer, Server-Driven UI Platform Team (Aug 2023 – Sep 2024)
    • Produced a greenfield UX from concept to 100% with zero incidents.
    • Achieved 2.5x+ increase in requests per second with ~45% fewer containers.
    • Built a mobile-focused alerting system using Datadog's SDK, logs, and metrics for mobile on-call.
  3. F1 Technologies

    Sep 2018 – Dec 2020
    Node.jsJavaScriptMicroservicesAWSReactRedisElasticsearchKubernetesDockerPostgreSQLMongoDB
    Senior Software Engineer
    • Led internationalization efforts for UI and backend, improving the global user experience.
    • Lowered business-critical error rates from 5% to ~0.01%.
    • Served as primary liaison for an international QA team, ensuring seamless collaboration.
    • Implemented EU 2FA banking rules using Stripe's SDK/API.
    • Architected numerous microservices to detangle a legacy monolithic codebase.
  4. Cox Automotive Digital Retailing

    Sep 2018 – Dec 2020
    Node.jsJavaScriptMicroservicesAWSReactRedisDockerMongoDB
    Fullstack Software Engineer II
    • Improved delivery success rate of consumer communications to dealers from 70% to 93%+.
    • Reduced request times by up to 90% through performance optimizations.
    • Created an integration test framework added to the pipeline to preemptively detect regression issues.
    • Spearheaded MicroUI research using React/Redux, Webpack, and single-spa.
    • Led and managed multiple major deployments with smooth production transitions.
  5. Georgia Tech Research Institute

    Oct 2015 – Jan 2017
    JavaAngularGuiceJerseySpockMockito
    Fullstack Software Engineer II
    • Overhauled secure web apps and server code using AngularJS, Java, Guice, and Jersey.
    • Optimized applications handling binary data in databases, resolving scalability and performance challenges.
    • Rapidly deployed web apps to streamline help desk ticket creation.
  6. IPSwitch

    Mar 2014 – Oct 2015
    JavaScriptExtJSC#SQL Server
    Software Engineer
    • Debugged across the entire stack of projects from CSS to C++ legacy codebases.
    • Leveraged Highcharts for network traffic visualization via Netflow protocol.
    • Restructured HTML, JS, and CSS components to improve visual consistency across a large reskinning effort.
    • Collaborated on a complete UI overhaul using Sencha ExtJS versions 4 to 6 including UI/UX experiments.
  7. Automated Logic

    Jun 2012 – Mar 2014
    JavaJavaScriptjQueryCSSHTMLHighcharts
    Software Engineer
    • Automated ISO build install/verification processes using Java, Groovy, and Gradle.
    • Developed web application add-ons across the stack (CSS, HTML, jQuery, Java, Spock).
    • Created a proof-of-concept Android app for room-level remote temperature control for a Hackathon.