Hi, I'm
Muhammad Ashar
Mushtaq
Senior Backend / Fullstack Engineer·TypeScript · Node.js · NestJS · React · AWS
I build backend and fullstack systems that work and keep working.
6+ years owning the full engineering lifecycle of production SaaS — from system design through deployment, reliability, and being the person on call when things break.
German student residence permit · EU Blue Card–eligible on a qualifying full-time offer
About
Who I Am
My focus is production-grade engineering: systems designed not just to launch, but to stay reliable under real-world conditions.
Over 6+ years I've owned the full engineering lifecycle of production SaaS — from system design and API architecture through deployment, reliability, and being the person on call when things break. I've led the architecture-level re-engineering of a high-traffic live-events platform, running legacy and new systems in parallel with zero downtime through events like EDC and Formula 1. I've built frontend and design-system foundations for a German eVTOL aviation company under strict EU engineering standards. And I've delivered concurrency-safe, real-time pipelines engineered to hold up at peak traffic.
My core stack is TypeScript end to end: Node.js and NestJS on the backend, React and Next.js on the frontend, PostgreSQL for data, and AWS for infrastructure. I care about what makes systems survivable in production — event-driven messaging (Kafka, SQS), contract testing with Pact, observability, caching, and zero-downtime migrations — not just shipping features.
Currently based in Berlin, doing an M.Sc. in Research in Computer and Systems Engineering at TU Ilmenau alongside full-time work. Open to senior backend / fullstack roles in Berlin, Munich, or remote.
How I Work
Zero-downtime migrations as a default, not an afterthought. Contract testing at service boundaries so integrations don't break silently. Idempotency built into every critical write path. Observability instrumented from day one — not added after the first incident.
Zero-downtime migration
Legacy → microservices with parallel dual-stack and no user disruption
EU aviation-grade standards
Frontend & design system for a German eVTOL company under strict EU safety engineering
Production on-call ownership
Primary incident responder — CI/CD, observability, test-coverage gates all set up from scratch
Engineers mentored
From onboarding to independent delivery across AitchTech and SenaryBits
6+
Years production experience
3
Companies shipped to prod
5
Engineers mentored
Career
Professional Experience
6+ years building production systems across SaaS, healthcare, aviation, and event technology.
Senior Software Engineer
- Led the architecture-level re-engineering of a high-traffic live-events platform, migrating it off a legacy production system onto a modern microservices architecture for higher availability, reliability, and speed — owning the 'what to build and how' decisions while working directly with the founders of an early-stage startup.
- Designed and built the data-sync bridges that reconciled incompatible data models between the legacy and new systems, running both in parallel in production with zero downtime and no disruption to the tens of thousands of concurrent users during live events including EDC and Formula 1.
- Built on a monorepo with event-driven messaging (Kafka, SQS), PostgreSQL, NestJS/Node, and React — with caching, CI/CD via GitHub Actions, and observability via Sentry.
- Led code reviews, mentored two junior engineers to independent delivery, and used AI-assisted development (Cursor, Copilot) to accelerate delivery without sacrificing quality.
Software Engineer
- Contracted to a German eVTOL aircraft company (Volocopter) to build and integrate frontend features in React, Next.js, and TypeScript within a cross-functional engineering team under strict EU safety and engineering standards.
- Built and maintained a custom Chakra-UI design library of 100+ reusable components, standardising the UI and improving delivery speed across multiple product teams.
- Owned component testing (Jest, Cypress) and contract testing with Pact, ensuring reliable integration between services.
Software Engineer
- Delivered across multiple production SaaS products on a shared microservices stack over a four-year engagement — owning one of four major modules of a healthcare SaaS platform (FutureRx) end-to-end, from data model through API design to a React/TypeScript frontend.
- Built the checkout and live order-tracking experience for a high-volume food-ordering platform (CafeZupas): a concurrency-safe checkout microservice using PostgreSQL row-level locking, and a real-time order pipeline using WebSockets and Redis pub/sub, engineered to stay resilient under peak-hour traffic.
- Set code-review and documentation standards and mentored three junior engineers to independent delivery.
Portfolio
Selected Projects
Production systems built and shipped across live events, aviation, healthcare, and hospitality — each owned end-to-end.
OnTrack
Migrationvia AitchTech
Architecture re-engineering for a high-traffic live-events platform
OnTrack was a live-events platform running on a legacy production stack that had hit its architectural ceiling — growing reliability issues and no clear path to scale for the tens of thousands of concurrent users it needed to serve at events like EDC and Formula 1.
The approach was a controlled dual-stack migration: running the legacy system and the new microservices architecture in parallel in production, with zero downtime and no disruption to live events. The core engineering challenge was the data-sync layer — designing bridges that reconciled two structurally incompatible data models and kept both systems consistent across two large production datasets throughout the transition.
The new stack — Kafka event-driven messaging, NestJS services, PostgreSQL, and React — was phased in module by module until the legacy system could be fully decommissioned. Every cutover was planned for off-peak windows and validated with observability tooling before and after.
- Zero-downtime dual-stack migration
- Data-sync bridges reconciling two incompatible models across two large production datasets
- Served tens of thousands of concurrent users at EDC & Formula 1
- Full CI/CD with GitHub Actions + Sentry observability
CafeZupas
Real-timevia SenaryBits
Checkout & real-time order pipeline
Built a concurrency-safe checkout microservice and live order-tracking pipeline engineered to stay resilient under peak-hour traffic. Implemented row-level locking in PostgreSQL for inventory consistency and Redis pub/sub for real-time order state updates across WebSocket clients.
- Concurrency-safe checkout via PG row-level locking
- Real-time order tracking with WebSockets + Redis
- Peak-hour resilience tested under load
- Full test coverage with Jest
FutureRx
Healthcarevia SenaryBits
Healthcare platform core module
Owned one of four major modules of a healthcare SaaS platform end-to-end — from data model through API design to frontend delivery. Built within a microservices architecture using WebSockets for live clinical workflow updates, with Redis for session management and horizontal scaling.
- End-to-end module ownership across full stack
- Microservices architecture with inter-service messaging
- Live clinical workflow updates via WebSockets
- Redis-backed session and cache layer
Volocopter
Design Systemvia ILI.DIGITAL
Frontend & design system for an eVTOL pioneer
Built frontend features and a reusable Chakra UI component library of 100+ components for Germany's leading eVTOL company, operating under strict EU aviation-grade engineering standards. Components became the frontend foundation used across multiple product teams.
- 100+ reusable UI components with full documentation
- Contract testing with Pact across squad API boundaries
- Adopted as org-wide frontend foundation
- Cross-functional collaboration under EU safety standards
Personal / Side Projects
Side Projects
Personal builds — not currently live, but each one a real engineering problem solved.
Wellavi
Not liveAn intellectual coaching platform — not a course marketplace but a thinking-skills system. Users self-assess across cognitive patterns, receive a coach-evaluated score, then take structured classes on analytical thinking and problem solving.
NFT Marketplace
Not liveA broker marketplace for NFTs where digital assets are listed, bought, and sold. Users manage their accounts and NFT portfolios through a unified interface connecting to the underlying blockchain.
Gulaan
Not liveA clothing marketplace with a try-before-you-buy AR feature. Users browse garments, select one, and the app overlays it on their own photo so they can see how it looks before purchasing.
Texenc
Not liveA Fiverr-style freelance marketplace built for the Pakistani market — with service listings, client messaging, offer management, and integrated payment flow.
Technical Skills
What I Work With
A complete picture of my technical toolkit — from daily core stack to architecture, observability, and AI tooling.
Core Stack
Academic Background
Education
M.Sc. Research in Computer and Systems Engineering
Technische Universität Ilmenau
Germany
Focus: Artificial Intelligence
B.Sc. Computer Science
COMSATS University Islamabad
Pakistan
Focus: Algorithms · Data Structures · Machine Learning · Software Engineering · System Design
Communication
Languages
Work Authorization — Germany
German student residence permit (currently valid). EU Blue Card–eligible on a qualifying full-time offer. Available immediately for full-time employment.
Currently Learning & Building
Currently Learning & Building
Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)
In ProgressBuilding an end-to-end RAG pipeline in Python to go deep on the retrieval side of LLM systems. Generating embeddings, storing and querying them with vector search (pgvector on Postgres), and grounding model output against a private knowledge base so answers stay factual and cite their sources. Focusing on the parts that actually decide quality — chunking strategy, retrieval relevance, and evaluating answer faithfulness — rather than just wiring up a demo.
Get in touch
Let's Work Together
I'm currently open to full-time opportunities in the German IT market. Whether you're hiring for a senior engineering role, exploring a contract, or want to discuss a project — I'd love to hear from you.
Send me an email