Hi! I'm Gerrit Gärtner, your AWS expert. My journey began as founder of an ed-tech startup. Transitioning to positions in established software companies and enterprises, I deepened my expertise in cloud architecture and software implementation.
Now, as a freelancer, I bring this rich tapestry of experiences to help startups and SMEs leverage AWS cloud solutions for growth and efficiency:
I employ proactive communication and a can-do attitude to support my clients best. I focus on efficiency and work agile.
I've architected, implemented and operated with teams several critical production systems. I know AWS, being 5x certified.
I support teams on all aspects of cloud solutions: requirements, architecture, implementation, operations and optimisation.
I've worked in professional software development roles for over a decade with all company sizes: startup, SME and enterprise.
No matter if it's the first endevour or your business is already cloud mature. I support your business in AWS, either working as full service contractor or specialist in a larger team.
For novel cloud solutions, a thought-out architecture that fits your business needs is essential. I design AWS architectures with focus on performance, security, cost, reliability and straight forward operation. My architecture designs are adaptable and extensible to fit the agile lifecycle.
Cloud solutions are implemented according to industry best practices using infrastructure as code. I implement software components typically serverless to simplify later operations. As per DevOps methology, operations is automated already as part of the implementation to minimize the later maintenance overhead.
An outside perspective often helps to further improve existing cloud solutions. I collaborate together with teams to enhance their existing cloud solutions in regard of security, cost optimisation and automating operations. For the business, this results in an increase of quality while reducing costs..
Despite automated operations, cloud solutions still require some human attention. I'm there to maintain, upgrade and monitor the cloud solutions that your business is depending on.
To get started, please use the form on the right to reach out to me. I'll reply within 24h to setup an 1h call to discuss your project. The call is without any obligations, free of charge and will happen within 7 days after your initial contact.
To speed things further up, I've answered some of the questions which are typically asked during the calls in advance:
Yes, I mainly work remotely from the beautiful Europe country Cyprus in the Mediterranean Sea. While working on your project, I’m reachable via chat and calls.
The timezone of Cyprus is GMT+2, ideal for business clients located in european countries. Also, Cyprus has excellent flight connections to most european countries, I can join your workshops in person on short notice.
I’m working agile, depending on the project typically either lightweight via a Kanban board (e.g. Trello) or following Scrum with a product backlog (e.g. Jira). Based on business needs, the project is split in priotised increments which are iteratively deliveried.
Cloud architectures are designed by me following AWS well-architected principles for highest quality and implemented via IaC (e.g. AWS CDK) to make them reproducible. Follwing DevOps best practices, operations is automated from the start.
Code is managed via repositories (e.g. Gitlab, Bitbucket) and deployed using a CICD pipeline. I prefer to use at least three environments (e.g. Dev, Test, Prod), possibly in seperate AWS accounts.
As per agile principles, documentation is created where needed. In addition to commented code, I create architecture diagrams (via Lucidchart or PlantUML), maintain ADRs (architecture decision records) and solution designs where applicable.
For AWS infrastructure, I prefer AWS CDK (using either Typescript or Phyton) as IaC tool. I’ve also worked with Terraform.
Where possible, I implement business logic as microservices using serverless AWS components (Lambda, Fargate). This minimizes later operational overhead.I’ve got extensive experience using EC2 clusters also including automated maintenance and scaling. I use these where serverless is not an adequate solution.
Services are written either via Typescript, Python, Golang or Java. I prefer Typescript and Python for simple services typically running in Lambdas and Typescript (NodeJS), Java (Spring Boot) or Golang (Gin) for more complex services running in Docker containers on AWS Fargate. The services are kept behind an API layer build from AWS components optimized for security.
While frontends are not my focus, I’ve created several using React. I delivery frontends via AWS using S3 and Cloudfront.
