Ilian M.-Fractional CTO / Product, Platform & AI Systems Leader
Check rate
Experience
Cybersecurity / AI Initiative
Expert Allies
Minimal. Executive. Operator-first.
- Participated in delivery leadership for an AI-powered DNS traffic analysis and filtering platform
- Supported delivery and product planning activities for AI-enabled enterprise software initiatives
CPTO
Dentobook
Healthcare SaaS Platform
- Led the redesign and rebuild of a healthcare SaaS platform, simplifying architecture, reducing infrastructure complexity, and improving maintainability while acting as product owner, technical lead, and delivery owner.
- Simplified an overengineered architecture to reduce infrastructure cost and improve maintainability for the current stage of the business.
- Used product analytics, user feedback, and operational observation to prioritize improvements and reduce friction in clinic workflows.
- Balanced product needs, technical debt, cost, security, and delivery speed while operating with limited startup resources.
- Owned architectural decisions across authentication, scheduling, integrations, notifications, reporting, cloud infrastructure, and operational workflows.
Zonal (Hospitality Technology)
Zonal
- Supported delivery scaling across hospitality software initiatives
- SSO integrations
- modernization of interconnected application ecosystems
- Fixing tech debt of over 1200 empty automated tests, reducing to under 10% in less than 6 months.
Landmark Information Group (PropTech)
Landmark Information Group
- Oversaw delivery coordination for a customer-facing developer experience and integrations platform.
- Involved in extending a proptech product and building from scratch of a DevExperience portal, which enabled external integrations with self-onboarding.
- Mean release time when I joined was 16 months, and reduced to 8 weeks after the first 6 months of implementing a scaled agile framework.
Founder & Executive Operator
Safyron / Expert Allies
Remote-first technology consultancy delivering software, automation, platform modernization, and operational systems for SaaS, hospitality, proptech, cybersecurity, and enterprise customers.
- Built and scaled a distributed technology organization to nearly 100 people across engineering, QA, recruitment, HR, operations, and delivery.
- Led delivery of integration-heavy software initiatives involving APIs, SSO, data workflows, internal tools, and customer-facing platforms.
Minimal. Executive. Operator-first.
- Helped customers reduce delivery friction by improving architecture decisions, team structure, technical ownership, and operational visibility.
- Worked directly with founders and leadership teams to translate business goals into technical roadmaps, implementation plans, and delivery systems.
- Designed and reviewed systems involving multiple stakeholder groups, platform workflows, permissions models, integrations, billing flows, and operational automation.
- Conducted technology, process, and delivery audits to identify bottlenecks, redundant workflows, operational risks, and opportunities for automation.
Engineering Manager
Solarwinds MSP
- I was overseeing a Platform Engineering team responsible for shared services like
- SSO
- Feature Flags
- Internal authentication of services
- K8s platform integration and others.
- Self-organized and a mixed team.
- We picked up the services in a no-documentation state, then created internal channels, and reverse engineered how they work. In a year's time, there was a small community helping other internal teams onboard for 1-2 days in total to each.
Back-End Team Lead
Trixir
- We were developing a highly scalable game engine for the Ed Tech industry
- I ran the backend of it.
- We architected the system from scratch, while maintaining the contract-first approach between our and the FE teams.
Engineering Team Lead
TechHuddle
- I was working in healthtech company, which was developing a steps tracker.
- We entirely rebuild the backend platform (migrated 20+ thousand of users with no downtime), while starting the fresh mobile app from scratch.
- Built a cross-functional team which did all the work, and everybody was able to work kanban style (i.e. fullstack).
Industry experience
See where this freelancer has spent most of their professional time.
Experienced in Information Technology, Healthcare, Tourism, Real Estate, and Education.
Business area experience
See which departments and functions this freelancer has contributed to most.
Experienced in Information Technology, Product Development, and Project Management.
Summary
Technology and operations leader with 15+ years of experience translating business problems into scalable systems, automation workflows, and practical software delivery.
Built and scaled a software services company to nearly 100 people while overseeing engineering, delivery, customer operations, recruitment, and strategic execution.
Hands-on builder with recent experience rewriting a SaaS platform using Python FastAPI, React, and PostgreSQL, while acting as product owner, technical lead, and operator.
Focused on AI-assisted workflows, systems integration, internal tools, data visibility, and reducing manual operational effort without overengineering.
Skills
Core Strengths
- Distributed Team Leadership
- Vendor & Offshore Team Oversight
- Executive Stakeholder Management
- Ai-Assisted Engineering Workflows
- Founder & Executive Partnership
- Ai Automation & Agentic Workflows
- Systems Architecture & Integrations
- Internal Tools & Workflow Design
- Data Visibility & Decision Support
- E-Commerce / Saas Operations
- Systems Audit & Operational Optimization
Ai, Automation & Workflow Systems
- Delivered Document Intelligence And Retrieval Workflows For A Cybersecurity Platform Using Rag-Style Approaches To Improve Knowledge Discovery Across Large Enterprise Document Sets.
- Designed And Evaluated Ai-Enabled Workflows Focused On Automation, Information Retrieval, Reporting, Decision Support, And Operational Efficiency Improvements.
- Comfortable Identifying Where Ai Can Reduce Manual Work, Improve Operational Decision-Making, And Increase Team Speed Without Creating Fragile Ai Theatre.
- Practical Focus On Measurable Ai Use Cases: Workflow Automation, Reporting, Customer Support, Document Processing, Internal Tooling, And Decision Intelligence.
- Evaluated And Implemented Ai-Assisted Workflows Focused On Reducing Manual Effort, Improving Information Retrieval, Accelerating Delivery, And Supporting Operational Decision-Making.
Relevant Operational Experience
- Technology Roadmap Creation
- Ai Workflow Discovery And Prioritization
- Internal Tools And Workflow Automation
- Api-First Systems Thinking
- Product Analytics And Usage Tracking
- Data Visibility And Reporting Systems
- Build Vs Buy Decision-Making
- Founder And Leadership Advisory
Selective Technology Stack
- Python
- Fastapi
- React
- Postgresql
- Docker
- Rest Apis
- Rbac
- Sso
- Ai-Assisted Workflows
- Rag-Style Retrieval
- Api Integrations
- Saas Architecture
- Analytics
- Engineering Operations
Languages
Education
Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”
Bachelor's degree · Information Systems · Sofia, Bulgaria
Statistics
Experience
Global experience
Expertise
Qualifications
Profile
Frequently asked questions
Have questions? Find more information here.
Ilian is based in Sofia, Bulgaria and can operate in on-site, hybrid, and remote work models.
Ilian speaks the following languages: Bulgarian (Native), English (Advanced).
Ilian has at least 10 years of experience. During this time, Ilian has worked in at least 8 different roles and for 8 different companies. The average length of individual experience is 1 year and 4 months. Note that Ilian may not have shared all experience and actually has more experience.
Based on recent experience, Ilian would be well-suited for roles such as: Cybersecurity / AI Initiative, CPTO, Zonal (Hospitality Technology).
Ilian's most recent position is Cybersecurity / AI Initiative at Expert Allies.
In recent years, Ilian has worked for Expert Allies, Dentobook, Zonal, Landmark Information Group, and Safyron / Expert Allies.
Ilian is most experienced in industries like Information Technology, Healthcare, and Tourism. Ilian also has some experience in Real Estate and Education.
Ilian is most experienced in business areas like Information Technology, Product Development, and Project Management.
Ilian has recently worked in industries like Information Technology, Tourism, and Real Estate.
Ilian has recently worked in business areas like Information Technology, Product Development, and Project Management.
Ilian holds a Bachelor in Information Systems from Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”.
Ilian is immediately available part-time for suitable projects.
Daily rate distribution
The rates shown represent the typical market range for freelancers in this position based on recent contracts on our platform.
Average rates for similar positions
Rates are based on recent contracts and do not include FRATCH margin.
The average daily rate is the mean of all daily rates from recent contracts of comparable freelancers on our platform.
The median daily rate is the middle value of all daily rates — half of comparable freelancers charge less, half charge more. Unlike the average, it is barely affected by outliers.
Calculated based on our freelancers’ daily rates as of 4 Oct 2026. Actual rates may vary depending on seniority level, experience, skill specialization, project complexity, and engagement length.
Similar freelancers
Discover other experts with similar qualifications and experience
Martin D.
Slavi S.
Silvija G.
Paul W.
Chrisabel P.
Stefan R.
Frédéric K.
Plamen M.
Frank G.
Alexander P.
Experts recently working on similar projects
Freelancers with hands-on experience in comparable project as a Cybersecurity / AI Initiative
Martin M.
Maksim T.
Antonio B.
Nikolai G.
Alexandru D.
Lubo D.
Rosen N.
Manuel P.
Laurin H.
Denis D.
Nearby freelancers
Professionals working in or nearby Sofia, Bulgaria
Radosveta D.
Zinaida I.
Monika F.
Ilian T.
Georgi B.
Emil R.
Dimitar S.
Ekaterina G.
Boyan I.
Anna A.
