Open to opportunities

Darren Gates

@darrengates

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Senior software engineer and technical delivery lead specializing in full‑stack, cloud, and AI solutions.

United States

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What I'm looking for

I seek senior engineering roles where I can lead technical strategy, modernize systems, implement CI/CD and AI integrations, mentor teams, and deliver measurable product impact.

I am a Senior Software Engineer and Technical Delivery Lead with over 15 years delivering scalable web, mobile, and AI-driven products for global brands. I blend hands-on full‑stack development (React, Node.js, AWS) with system-level thinking to solve complex problems.

I've led distributed engineering teams across the entire SDLC — from architecture and planning to deployment and post-release optimization — introducing DevOps pipelines and automated QA to accelerate releases. My work includes rebuilding legacy apps, rebuilding mobile apps in React Native, and modernizing front-end architectures for performance and maintainability.

I have architected AI integrations using ChatGPT/OpenAI APIs and custom models to produce measurable business outcomes, such as a 70% reduction in manual lookup time for an AI image recognition platform and a 30% faster release cadence after CI/CD and test automation improvements.

Passionate about mentoring and education, I founded a nonprofit coding academy and have taught university programming labs. I seek roles where I can drive technical strategy, improve engineering delivery, and build reliable, user-focused products.

Experience

Work history, roles, and key accomplishments

Senior Software Engineer

FlyCompliant

Jan 2023 - Oct 2025 (2 years 9 months)

Led modernization of an aviation compliance platform, rebuilding web and mobile apps and implementing an AWS CI/CD pipeline to automate deployments and improve release speed by 30%. Rewrote iOS/Android apps in React Native and introduced automated testing and Agile practices to improve maintainability and QA cycles.

React 18+React Native AWS CodePipeline Lambda S3 RDS Puppeteer GitHub Actions TypeScript CI CD

Senior Software Engineer

Designory

Sep 2012 - Jan 2023 (10 years 4 months)

Contributed to enterprise-grade digital solutions for global clients, building React and AWS-based applications including an Amazon Chime SDK video conferencing solution and multi-site WordPress platforms, improving performance and compliance for large clients.

React AWS S3 RDS EC2 Lambda WordPress Amazon Chime SDK PHP

Founder & Instructor

Long Beach Code Academy

Sep 2012 - Jan 2020 (7 years 4 months)

Founded and managed a nonprofit after-school coding program teaching Python and electronics to K-12 students, developed project-based curricula, and oversaw operations and partnerships for over 100 students.

Python Raspberry Pi Curriculum Design Teaching Program Management K 12 Education Community Outreach

Senior Engineer

Proactive SEO Solutions

Nov 2014 - Jan 2018 (3 years 2 months)

Led front-end and back-end development for high-traffic marketing and eCommerce sites, building and maintaining large WordPress/BuddyPress platforms and optimizing performance through caching, CDN, and MySQL tuning.

WordPress PHP MySQL WooCommerce JavaScript Performance Optimization CDN HTML5 CSS3

Web Developer

Warner Music Group

Nov 2008 - Feb 2016 (7 years 3 months)

Developed content platforms and music apps for major labels, built digital download delivery systems and early streaming integrations, and delivered iOS/Android music discovery applications.

PHP MySQL Drupal IOS SDK Android SDK JavaScript HTML5

Graduate Instructor

University of California, Irvine

Jan 1999 - Dec 2000 (1 year 11 months)

Taught undergraduate programming courses and managed computer labs, supporting curriculum delivery and student learning in information and computer science.

Python Java

Education

Degrees, certifications, and relevant coursework

University of California, Irvine

Master of Science, Information & Computer Science

1999 - 2001

Activities and societies: Graduate Instructor & Lab Manager; taught undergraduate programming and maintained university computer labs.

Completed graduate studies in Information & Computer Science and served as a graduate instructor and lab manager for undergraduate programming courses.