About me

Mike Carter talking to a group of people in an office environment

Core technologies

  • Ruby:RailsHotwireHotwire Native
  • JavaScript:Node.jsTypeScriptReactNext.js
  • Databases:PostgreSQLMySQLRedis
  • Infrastructure:AWSGCPDockerKamal
  • AI:OrchestrationCode GenerationRAG

I'm Mike Carter, a principal full-stack software engineer with two decades of experience designing, building, and scaling commercial web applications.

As a Software Architect at Holiday Extras, I shaped technical direction across a 120-strong team, and was a driving force behind migrating their core booking platform to a React SPA that's still processing thousands of bookings per day. I architected Laced's platform from its earliest days, and helped scale it to handle millions in transactions. At RIFT, I led the technical transformation of their tax refund claims process from manual to self-service, opening access to hundreds of thousands of claimants.

I've founded two companies, grown distributed engineering teams, and delivered across the full stack from cloud infrastructure to native mobile. I operate where architecture meets business strategy — technology selection, data model design, migrating millions of sensitive records under strict compliance constraints. I'm most valuable when the problem isn't which framework to use, but how to change a running system under real commercial pressure without breaking the business that depends on it.

Work

Over 13 years I've worked across organisations from 5-person startups to 500-employee enterprises, at every level from individual contributor to architect to founder.

Bitbrawn logo

BitBrawn 2021 - Now

I founded BitBrawn in 2021 to provide senior technical leadership to companies stuck with web applications they've outgrown. As principal engineer and architect on every engagement, I own the technical strategy — from initial system audit through to delivery — working directly with founders, CTOs, and product directors.

Visit BitBrawn →

Recent projects

  • Continued the modernisation I started at Leaf, upgrading the Rails framework, consolidating RIFT's fragmented data stores into a unified API, and extending the self-service experience to cover the full claims lifecycle. Across both engagements, claim submissions increased 192% and unique sign-ins rose 84%.
    Read case study →
  • Returned five years after building the original platform to architect multi-market support for Laced's European expansion. Introduced market-level abstractions across the full stack — shipping, pricing, listings, admin — without taking a live marketplace offline. Laced now ships globally.
    Read case study →
  • Three-month engagement to design and ship a property onboarding flow within a large legacy platform at the UK's biggest online estate agent (500+ employees, £300m+ market cap at peak). Worked within their existing architecture, deployment process, and data model under tight constraints.
    Read case study →
  • Took over a booking management platform after the lead developer left without warning or documentation. Mapped dozens of undocumented services, stabilised critical systems, and now lead ongoing modernisation.
    Read case study →
  • Rebuilt their legacy PHP subscriptions platform using Next.js with a configurable backing CMS. Dramatically simplified the process of purchasing a subscription for their tens of thousands of subscribers.
Leaf logo

Leaf 2016 - 2021

As co-founder and Engineering Director at Leaf, I owned strategy and delivery end-to-end. I built a distributed team of seven, shipping Node.js, React, and Rails platforms for clients from early-stage marketplaces to established enterprises. Several are still running at scale today.

Visit Leaf →

Notable clients

  • Architected a React Native trip planning app, as an incubated product within Holiday Extras. Designed a Node.js and GraphQL backend, handling all types of trips, from fixed dates and destinations to entirely open-ended. Launched summer 2017.
    Read case study →
  • Led development of RIFT's first self-service claims platform, MyRIFT, replacing an entirely manual process. Built the pre-registration eligibility flow, document upload system, and integrated API lookups for addresses, vehicles, and bank details — achieving 99.8% address accuracy across 20,000+ records. This engagement laid the foundation for a multi-year modernisation I continued at BitBrawn.
    Read case study →
  • Architected and built Laced's marketplace platform from scratch using Ruby on Rails and React. Features included product listings, bulk seller tools, Stripe and PayPal integration, and a credit-based bidding system. The platform launched in early 2018 and scaled rapidly through the Covid sneaker boom, clearing £100m+ in total sales. I returned to the platform five years later through BitBrawn to architect their European expansion.
    Read case study →
Holiday Extras logo

Holiday Extras 2013 - 2016

I joined Holiday Extras as a developer and was promoted to Software Architect within the 120-strong engineering team. I led the migration of their core booking platform to a React SPA — a system processing 10,000+ bookings per day that's still in production today. I also led development of the company's first React Native mobile app and contributed to engineering practices, CI/CD infrastructure, and technical decision-making across the wider organisation.

Visit Holiday Extras →

Projects

Products I’ve designed, built, and operated end-to-end — from architecture and infrastructure through to the App Store.

IsThereSomebody logo

IsThereSomebody 2024 - Now

A support network for friends and family of people suffering with addiction. As sole engineer I own the full stack — a Rails 8 monolith, native iOS and Android apps, and cloud infrastructure. 700+ active users across three countries.

Visit IsThereSomebody →

Parable logo

Parable 2022 - 2023

An analytics platform tracking readership behaviour for blog authors. Built with Node.js and React, launched in 2022, and deliberately shut down in 2023 when the market proved too narrow. A formative lesson in validating demand before writing code.

Howdy logo

Howdy 2017 - 2022

A hosted API for web contact forms — validation, spam filtering, and email delivery with zero backend code. Built at Leaf as an internal tool, opened to the public, and organically grew to 100+ paying users before winding down.

Writing

Writing about the decisions that shape software systems — architecture, technical debt, and the trade-offs nobody warns you about.

Archive