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Nairobi, Kenya · UTC+3

Ryan Wanjie

Full-stack engineer building high-throughput systems in Go, Java and Kafka for platforms serving 10M+ users across 7 African markets.

Technical skills

Languages

Go, Java, TypeScript, JavaScript

Backend

Spring Boot, Node.js, gRPC, REST

Frontend

Vue 3, Nuxt, React, Tailwind CSS

Data & Streaming

PostgreSQL, Apache Kafka, Apache Flink, Redis

Infrastructure

Docker, Kubernetes, AWS, GCP

Practices

Event-driven design, Payment integrations, i18n, CI/CD

Professional experience

Sep 2024 — Jul 2026 · Nairobi, Kenya

Full-Stack Software Engineer

Betting & gaming platforms · 7 African markets

  • Shipped and maintained production platforms serving 10M+ users across 7 African markets, processing $1M+ in quarterly transactions.
  • Built a Kafka and Flink fraud-detection pipeline handling 50K+ events per minute at sub-200ms p99 latency.
  • Diagnosed a production write-latency collapse generating 40–50 support complaints an hour; traced it to unbounded table growth and resolved it with cron-based archival.
  • Re-architected a Nuxt frontend platform into modular services, cutting shipping time by 25%.
  • Built M-Pesa payment integrations with HMAC request signing, and fixed a silent payment-failure bug in a gRPC integration.
  • Resolved a recurring Kafka consumer crash loop caused by auto.offset.reset replaying malformed messages.
  • Delivered multilingual (English, Swahili, French) and multi-currency support across all 7 markets.
  • Ran multi-cluster Kubernetes deployments across AWS and GCP.

Jan 2025 — May 2025 · East Africa · Short-term contract

Technical Support Consultant

Fintech platforms

  • Maintained and enhanced Java Spring Boot backend services for live fintech products across multiple African markets within strict SLA requirements.
  • Contributed to the production launch of the Wakulima USSD platform in Tanzania, supporting system integration, go-live coordination, and post-launch stabilisation.
  • Delivered technical training to internal staff and external clients, improving platform adoption and operational capability.

Selected projects

All work →

React Native · Offline-first · SQLite

paramedic-triage-intake ↗

Offline-first React Native app for paramedic patient intake and triage. Built for ambulances where connectivity drops mid-transport — records queue locally and reconcile on reconnect.

Go · PostgreSQL · REST

Ticketing-BE ↗

Go backend for a ticketing platform. Event and seat management, ordering flow, and the concurrency handling that stops two people buying the same seat.

Go · PostgreSQL · RBAC

LMS ↗

Learning management system backend in Go. Courses, enrolment and progress tracking with role-based access across students, instructors and admins.

Education

2020 — 2024 · Machakos, Kenya

BSc Computer Science

Machakos University

Open to full-stack / backend roles

Got a system that needs to hold up under real traffic?

I'm looking for full-stack and backend roles where the hard part is the load, the latency or the money moving through it. Happy to talk through anything you're building.