Now
Tech Lead on data-heavy backend systems. I own planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery. I do the majority of the backend work myself and coordinate a project manager, a senior frontend engineer, and a senior backend engineer.
Cape Town, South Africa · globally remote · SAST (UTC+2)
Ettiene Wium
Tech Lead · Senior Backend / Software Engineer
Production systems · data pipelines · APIs · cloud · AI-assisted engineering
Globally remote Senior / Lead backend · Cape Town · SAST
Focus
Globally remote Senior, Lead, and Staff-track backend roles. Production systems, data pipelines, APIs, cloud, and AI-assisted engineering.
Tech Lead and senior backend engineer with eight years in production. I lead SAWIS BI: South African wine import, export, and domestic data, monthly synchronisation from a legacy Mapper pipeline into MySQL (tables over two million rows), and I do the majority of the backend myself. I coordinate a project manager, a senior frontend engineer, and a senior backend engineer, and I own client-facing planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery — including annual feature phases and major domestic-data work in 2026.
I also own Indawo as the client engineer, from spec through production, including restoring a failed host with Docker. AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional. Production Linux, Docker, and CI/CD. I use AI-assisted engineering daily (Cursor, Grok, Claude, Codex). Cape Town; targeting globally remote Senior and Lead backend roles.
I also own Indawo as the client engineer, from spec through production, including restoring a failed host with Docker. AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional. Production Linux, Docker, and CI/CD. I use AI-assisted engineering daily (Cursor, Grok, Claude, Codex). Cape Town; targeting globally remote Senior and Lead backend roles.
01
Selected work
Paid production first. Homelab is labelled practice.
current
SAWIS BI
Problem
The South African wine industry needs import, export, and domestic data in one production system. Source of truth for a large cut of that data is a legacy Mapper system. The business depends on that data landing correctly every month, and on import/export jobs completing.
My responsibility
Tech Lead. I do the majority of the backend. I own the destination database and application path: monthly synchronisation from Mapper into our MySQL (tables over two million rows), import/export jobs, and recovery when a run fails. I own planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery, including annual feature phases (major domestic-data work in 2026).
Decisions
Treat Mapper as the client's legacy extractor; own load, schema, validation, and repair on our side so a failed month can be traced through PHP and MySQL instead of guessed.
Leadership
I coordinate a project manager, a senior frontend engineer, and a senior backend engineer. I am the client-facing technical owner.
Outcome
Monthly Mapper syncs and wine-industry import/export continue in production on tables over two million rows. Failed jobs get a recovered data path. Annual phases, including 2026 domestic data, ship under this lead.
current
Indawo
Problem
A production PHP product had to stay up for a client I own. The original on-prem host failed. Delivery still needed spec, cost, and sign-off, not only tickets.
My responsibility
I own the client relationship for engineering: planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery. I operate the application and guest OS.
Decisions
On hardware failure I containerised the legacy app with Docker on spare CentOS and restored publishing the same incident. The app now runs on an Azure VM; I operate the guest OS.
Leadership
Client-facing owner. Pull requests and a post-deploy health window.
Outcome
Production restored after host failure; still running. Delivery loop from spec to sign-off remains mine.
hosted
Freelance AWS fleet
Problem
A production PHP fleet needed a rebuildable AWS environment.
My responsibility
Freelance with a friend. Terraform for the stack in af-south-1.
Decisions
Environment in code: compute, RDS, pipeline.
Leadership
Shared freelance delivery.
Outcome
Live at fleet.wiums.co.za. Public repo github.com/EttieneW/tf-fleet-iac.
homelab
Homelab
Problem
No industry Kubernetes cluster at work.
My responsibility
Private streaming stack; I treat uptime as my problem.
Decisions
Docker on Linux; k3s/k3d to practise cluster failure.
Leadership
Solo.
Outcome
Homelab only — not paid production Kubernetes.
02
Skills
Kubernetes (k3s) and Terraform are listed under skills as homelab / freelance.
- 8Backend — PHP, Laravel, Symfony, APIs, integrations
- 8MySQL — production modelling, monthly syncs, tables over 2 million rows
- 8Linux
- 8 / 4Docker — local / production
- 4AWS — EC2, Lambda, RDS, IAM
- 2CI/CD — PRs, CodePipeline, post-deploy health watch
- 2Terraform — freelance and homelab
- 2Kubernetes — homelab k3s/k3d
- dailyAI-assisted engineering — Cursor, Grok, Claude, Codex
How I lead a client
- 1Client-facing planning and estimation
- 2Technical decisions on the backend and data path
- 3Majority of backend implementation
- 4Coordinate PM, senior frontend, and senior backend through delivery
Leadership
- Tech Lead, SAWIS BI
- Client-facing planning, estimation, technical decisions, delivery
- Coordinate PM, senior frontend, senior backend
- Majority of backend implementation
Backend
- PHP / Laravel (8 years production)
- Symfony and custom PHP
- REST APIs and integrations
Data
- MySQL (8 years; tables over 2 million rows)
- Monthly sync from legacy Mapper into our database
- Import/export and domestic wine-industry data
- Relational modelling
Cloud / platform
- AWS (EC2, Lambda, RDS, IAM) — DevOps Engineer Professional
- Linux (Ubuntu)
- Docker (production)
- CI/CD (CodePipeline, PR deploys)
- Terraform (freelance / homelab)
- Kubernetes (homelab k3s/k3d)
AI tooling
- Cursor, Grok, Claude, Codex (daily assistants)
Languages
- PHP
- SQL
- JavaScript (frontend collaboration)
- Python (scripting)
- Bash
- Afrikaans (native)
- English (fluent)
03
Experience
April 2022 – Present
Silicon Overdrive
Tech Lead and Senior Backend Engineer
- Tech Lead on SAWIS BI, a production system for South African wine import, export, and domestic industry data. I do the majority of the backend. I coordinate a project manager, a senior frontend engineer, and a senior backend engineer.
- Own the monthly synchronisation from their legacy Mapper system into our MySQL database. Some tables exceed two million rows. When a sync or import/export job fails, I trace the data path and restore it.
- Own client-facing planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery. New project phases ship annually; 2026 includes major domestic-data changes.
- Own Indawo as the client engineer: spec, cost, plan, and ship. When the on-prem host died I moved the legacy PHP app into Docker on spare hardware, restored publishing, and later operated it on an Azure VM at the guest-OS layer.
- Production delivery on Indawo: pull requests and a post-deploy health window. AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional; EC2, RDS, Lambda, IAM, CodePipeline, Linux, Docker in production.
June 2018 – March 2022
RogerWilco
Backend / Software Engineer
- Built and ran production backends on Ubuntu and AWS: Laravel, Symfony, custom PHP, plus Drupal and WordPress modules I owned.
- Delivered an RBAC member dashboard (Global Self-Care Federation) and live JSE data graphs.
- Production support on client sites (usb.ac.za, waterfront.co.za): compatibility, DNS/TLS, security reviews.
04
Certifications and education
AWS certifications
- AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional (DOP-C02)
- AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate
- AWS Certified SysOps Administrator – Associate
- AWS Certified Developer – Associate
- AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
Education
- BSc Information Technology — Eduvos, Year 1 (in progress; full working week + online classes)
- Information Systems Engineering (ISE), CTI Education Group, 2017–2018
- Matric, DF Malan High School, Bellville, class of 2016 (two distinctions)
05
Cover letter
I am applying as a Tech Lead and senior backend engineer — eight years in production, currently leading SAWIS BI. That system holds South African wine import, export, and domestic industry data. Each month we synchronise from a legacy Mapper pipeline into our MySQL database; some tables exceed two million rows. I do the majority of the backend, I coordinate a project manager, a senior frontend engineer, and a senior backend engineer, and I own planning, estimation, technical decisions, and delivery, including annual phases and the 2026 domestic-data work.
I like hard debugging: when a sync or import fails I follow the data, not the ticket title. On Indawo, when the host died I containerised the app with Docker and brought production back. I hold AWS DevOps Engineer Professional and I run Linux, Docker, and CI/CD in production. I use Cursor, Grok, Claude, and Codex every day as engineering tools — not as a substitute for owning the system.
I work globally remotely from Cape Town (SAST). Production languages today are PHP and SQL; I learn the house stack on the job.
Thank you. I would welcome a conversation.
06