Location: Netherlands / GMT+2
Remote: Yes. Experienced with UK and US clients; open to timezone overlap.
Willing to relocate: No. Occasional travel is fine.
Technologies: Node.js/TypeScript, ClickHouse, PostgreSQL, Redis, Elasticsearch/OpenSearch, DuckDB, Vue, Tailwind, event-driven systems, low-latency data pipelines, analytics infrastructure, and hybrid search/retrieval. Also comfortable with Python and Rust.
Résumé/CV: Available upon request
LinkedIn: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/geert-brits/" rel="nofollow">https://www.linkedin.com/in/geert-brits/
Email: gbrits<at>gmail<dot>com
Hands-on Staff/Principal engineer and architect with 20+ years of experience building backend systems, data-intensive products, search and retrieval infrastructure, internal tools, and applied-AI workflows.
I’m most useful when the business goal is understood but the product and technical shape are not. I help clarify what should be built, make tradeoffs explicit, shape the architecture, and build the critical parts myself. Backend is where I’m most at home, but I regularly work across APIs, data, frontend applications, analytics interfaces, and production operations. I bring strong product and UX judgment without moving away from implementation.
Selected work:
- Principal engineer and architect on a ground-up KPI and analytics platform rewrite with a five-person team, including its data models, self-service dashboards, and drill-down workflows. The company later exited for approximately €10M.
- Technical founder of a market-intelligence SaaS matching more than one million dynamic segments against continuous on-chain and off-chain streams, backed by ClickHouse pipelines processing billions of rows per day.
- Rebuilt a live B2B marketplace using Node.js, Vue, and Elasticsearch, including saved-search matching and notification infrastructure. Currently improving its search quality using hybrid retrieval, sparse-vector signals, reciprocal rank fusion, and reranking.
I prefer freelance and contract work as a hands-on senior IC at Staff or Principal level. Founding Engineer roles are also a strong fit. I’m open to full-time opportunities when the product, team, and role are an exceptional match.
Best fit: backend-heavy products, applied AI and workflow automation, analytics infrastructure, search and retrieval systems, complex internal tools, or early-stage teams that need architecture, product judgment, and implementation depth. My preferred leadership track is through product shaping, technical direction, mentoring, and hands-on engineering rather than people management.
gbrits · · focus · HN ↗
Hands-on Staff/Principal engineer and architect with 20+ years of experience building backend systems, data-intensive products, search and retrieval infrastructure, internal tools, and applied-AI workflows.
I’m most useful when the business goal is understood but the product and technical shape are not. I help clarify what should be built, make tradeoffs explicit, shape the architecture, and build the critical parts myself. Backend is where I’m most at home, but I regularly work across APIs, data, frontend applications, analytics interfaces, and production operations. I bring strong product and UX judgment without moving away from implementation.
Selected work:
- Principal engineer and architect on a ground-up KPI and analytics platform rewrite with a five-person team, including its data models, self-service dashboards, and drill-down workflows. The company later exited for approximately €10M.
- Technical founder of a market-intelligence SaaS matching more than one million dynamic segments against continuous on-chain and off-chain streams, backed by ClickHouse pipelines processing billions of rows per day.
- Rebuilt a live B2B marketplace using Node.js, Vue, and Elasticsearch, including saved-search matching and notification infrastructure. Currently improving its search quality using hybrid retrieval, sparse-vector signals, reciprocal rank fusion, and reranking.
I prefer freelance and contract work as a hands-on senior IC at Staff or Principal level. Founding Engineer roles are also a strong fit. I’m open to full-time opportunities when the product, team, and role are an exceptional match.
Best fit: backend-heavy products, applied AI and workflow automation, analytics infrastructure, search and retrieval systems, complex internal tools, or early-stage teams that need architecture, product judgment, and implementation depth. My preferred leadership track is through product shaping, technical direction, mentoring, and hands-on engineering rather than people management.