# Samuel Cole CTO and founding engineer. I make things from scratch, then scale them. --- ## Experience ### 6. LEMONTREE **CTO** · 2021–2026 Transformed a handful-a-day NYC helpline into a food-access system helping over a million people in 11 regions in 2025. Owned technology strategy, budget, and infrastructure; hired and managed a 3–5-person global team, mentored a junior engineer, and advised on org-wide personnel decisions. Architected the platform across Twilio, Postgres/AWS, and Vertex AI. Built a Gemini Flash–orchestrated flagging system that enriches resource data with client ground reports and automated web research, escalating to Deepgram-transcribed calls. The team cleared 68% more flags per week and shrank the backlog monthly. Closed out with my context in markdown so future contributors can ship by prompting without losing it. ### 5. ACTBLUE **Senior Software Engineer** · 2017–2021 At the Democratic fundraising platform: rewrote the main donation form server (Ruby Sinatra → Node; ops later lifted it to AWS unchanged) and the company's PCI tokenizer. Solo, built a new embed from scratch (100% test coverage) that powered the Biden presidential campaign, the NAACP, Everytown, and more, as contributions scaled from ~$1B to over $8B. ### 4. ABACUS **Full Stack Engineer** · 2015–2017 One of 5 engineers building tools for enterprises to manage employee spending. Shipped receipt view, a redesigned search and faceting system, automated flight metadata, and trip-level grouping. Acquired by Emburse. ### 3. JUKELY **Lead Web Engineer** · 2014–2015 Employee #8 at a live-music subscription startup. Built the client-side app from scratch in React / webpack / Reflux; contributed to the Rails API and Stripe integration. When the CEO announced a Canada launch a week out with no code written, shipped full-stack currency and localization, on time. ### 2. KICKSTARTER **Software Engineer** · 2010–2014 Employee #12, one of the first two full-time engineers. Owned the client side as Kickstarter scaled from $28M in annual pledges to crossing $1B cumulative (March 2014). Built the front-end of the multistep project editor (still the basic shape of today's flow), site search, custom text editors, creator messaging/backer tools, admin tooling, and the first mainstream video player to default to HTML5. ### 1. PATCH **Front End Web Engineer** · 2008–2010 First front-end engineer; joined before the company had a name. Built the CMS and front-end architecture that scaled to hundreds of small-town news sites across America, plus bespoke neighborhood maps. Acquired by AOL. --- ## Education ### 0. ROCHESTER INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY · 2004–2008 B.S., Multidisciplinary Studies: Computer Science & Literature; minor in Creative Writing --- ## Skills - **Core Stack:** TypeScript · Node.js · Next.js · React · Ruby on Rails - **Infra & Data:** Postgres · Prisma · Redis · AWS (RDS, ECS) · Vercel · GitHub Actions · ETL pipelines - **Platforms & AI:** Google Cloud · Vertex AI (Gemini) · AI SDK · LLM agents · Twilio · Mapbox --- ## Contact Information - New York, NY - sam@samuelcole.name - (718) 974-3543 - [github.com/samuelcole](https://github.com/samuelcole) - [linkedin.com/in/samuelcole](https://linkedin.com/in/samuelcole)