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MICHAEL ELLIS

@michaelellis

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Senior Java engineer delivering scalable, high-performance cloud-native systems.

United States

Message

What I'm looking for

I seek senior backend or cloud roles where I can lead migrations to microservices, improve system reliability, mentor engineers, and drive CI/CD and performance optimizations in a collaborative, agile environment.

I am a results-driven Senior Software Engineer with 17 years of experience designing, developing, and maintaining scalable, high-performance systems for major platforms.

I specialize in Java (JDK 8/11/17), Spring Boot, microservices, and cloud-native AWS architectures, and I have delivered solutions for products such as Twitch and Kindle.

I build and optimize RESTful APIs, event-driven systems using Kafka, and serverless solutions with AWS Lambda, focusing on high availability, security, and performance while leading migrations from monoliths to microservices.

I am passionate about mentoring engineers, implementing CI/CD with Jenkins and GitHub Actions, and driving continuous improvement in development practices and operational reliability.

Experience

Work history, roles, and key accomplishments

Current

Senior Software Engineer

Current

Twitch

May 2018 - Present (7 years 7 months)

Led development and scaling of Twitch desktop and backend services using Java and Spring Boot, implementing microservices and event-driven Kafka pipelines that improved throughput and reduced latency while increasing system reliability.

Java Spring Boot AWS Lambda S3 ECS Kafka PostgreSQL Redis Docker Kubernetes CI CD

Senior Software Engineer

Amazon

May 2011 - Aug 2017 (6 years 3 months)

Led migrations of Kindle and Twitch backend services to Spring Boot and microservices, developed RESTful APIs and event-driven systems with Kafka, and migrated workloads to AWS to improve scalability and maintainability.

Java Spring Boot Microservices AWS Lambda S3 DynamoDB RDS Kafka PostgreSQL MongoDB Junit TDD

Software Engineer

Soma Networks

May 2009 - Aug 2009 (3 months)

Developed Java-based network performance tools and REST APIs, integrated Spring libraries, and built AWS-backed storage solutions to improve monitoring, automation, and analysis of network test results.