Senior Software Engineer · London

Hakeem Kushoro

I’m a software engineer in London with seven years’ experience building developer tools, workflow platforms and payment systems

I’ve led React and TypeScript interface development, built Java/Spring Boot services and identity integrations, and improved existing systems through performance work and automated testing — alongside client delivery, releases and production support

Hakeem Kushoro holding a camera in a snowy mirrored installation
Full-stack · Backend · Product engineering
0.7 → 23 TPS
Java modernisation & regression toolingMy SQL, batching and concurrency work contributed to the team’s throughput increase; I built audit and replay tests alongside the performance changes
97%
API response-size reductionReduced an event-activity API response that exceeded 30 MB as part of wider React/TypeScript ownership covering workflow views, graphs, state management and API integration
Since 2019
Software engineering across developer tools, backend services and web applications
OIDC
Reusable identity integrationBuilt a federation service with Redis-backed refresh/logout, Vault secrets, mTLS and signing-key rotation, with tests for authentication and recovery from dependency outages
Workflow control
Events, scheduling & monitoringBuilt Java/Spring Boot services with START, STOP, PAUSE and HOLD controls, cron scheduling, telemetry and failure alerts through Geneos and email
Replay tests
Regression tests from recorded runsBuilt audit and JSON specification tests to recreate database state and verify payment outputs, then helped build services that generated tests from recorded production payments
Production
Monthly releases & incident supportManaged releases and production support, restored operational UIs and traced timeouts through application services and Cassandra
Hackathon winner
Tracks & PartyBotLed the Facebook UK regional winning team with a location-aware Spotify app, then built a Messenger jukebox and event media manager with the team at the Menlo Park finals

Projects

Galatea Associates · August 2020 – September 2026

Performance & test infrastructure · Client platform

Global Mass Pay FX

Modernised Java/Oracle payment services and built tests to compare their behaviour with recorded payment runs

  • Optimised SQL and HEXTORAW processing, batched requests, removed redundant loops and configured shared Java thread pools, contributing to the team’s throughput increase from approximately 0.7 to 23 transactions per second
  • Built a process-audit harness and JSON specification tests to replay recorded payments and verify their outputs and database changes
  • Helped build services that generated JSON specification tests from recorded production payments
  • Java
  • Oracle SQL
  • JDBC
  • Concurrency
  • Specification testing
Performance and specification tests

I worked across validation, enrichment, AML checks and debit/credit generation, replacing fixed file-system waits with heartbeat checks, upgrading JDBC for performance and testing, and fixing SQL race conditions

The audit harness recorded run IDs, inputs, outputs and Oracle reads and writes through start/end service calls; tests recreated the initial database state, replayed payment inputs and checked the results against the original run

Scenarios varied by currency, destination, location, contract, customer and bank; as they grew more complex, we moved from drafting individual tests with AI to generating them through services that read recorded payment information

Frontend & product ownership · Client platform

React and TypeScript frontend ownership

Owned frontend development and feature priorities for a workflow platform, serving as the main React/TypeScript contact for client developers and colleagues on the project

  • Built paginated AG Grid views for domains and events, linked SVG workflow graphs, and reusable React/Material UI components, with state managed through Redux
  • Reworked the event-activity API response for the workflow interface, cutting a 30 MB+ payload by 97%
  • Ran client demos every two to three months and turned feedback into Jira enhancements and fixes
  • React
  • TypeScript
  • Redux
  • AG Grid
  • Material UI
  • SVG
Events, state and API integration

I implemented client-side calculations and grid operations, connected Cassandra-backed APIs, and handled synchronous and asynchronous events, using background anomaly checks and non-blocking notifications to keep users informed while operations ran

I tested the interface with Jest and React Testing Library and used regular delivery calls and demos to agree changes with client developers

Backend & distributed systems · Client platform

Event-driven workflow services

Built Java/Spring Boot services to run and monitor configurable workflows, including workflows imported from external systems, with execution organised around events, graphs and per-instance domains and controls for scheduling and managing each workflow’s lifecycle

  • Implemented START, STOP, PAUSE and HOLD lifecycle controls, cron scheduling and checks for missed schedules, plus failure alerts through Geneos and email
  • Added event, graph and domain telemetry, metrics and failure monitoring for operational support
  • Built non-blocking processing with WebFlux/Reactor and multi-row CockroachDB writes through R2DBC, after evaluating jOOQ integration constraints
  • Profiled workflow controllers and entitlement adapters with JMeter/BlazeMeter tests spanning thousands of requests through Jenkins on Kubernetes, using P99 latency analysis to guide optimisation
  • Java
  • Spring Boot
  • WebFlux / Reactor
  • R2DBC
  • CockroachDB
Implementation and performance testing

I tested the services with Spring Boot Test and Mockito and documented performance findings and implementation choices for developers and reviewers

Identity & developer infrastructure · Internal platform

Reusable identity integration

Built a reusable OIDC federation service and its development environment, using AI tools during implementation and adding and testing capabilities in stages, including recovery from dependency outages

  • Implemented Redis-backed refresh/logout, Vault-managed secrets and mutual TLS to Keycloak
  • Published JWKS to preserve token verification during signing-key rotation
  • Added Vault seeding and certificate generation to Docker Compose, plus Testcontainers and CI checks for authentication and outage recovery
  • OIDC
  • Keycloak
  • Redis
  • Vault
  • mTLS / JWKS
  • Testcontainers
Development environment

The local environment generated TLS certificates into named volumes and seeded Vault secrets, with authentication and recovery tested across the service and its dependencies

Product delivery · Internal tool

Internal CRM

Built an internal CRM in Google Apps Script and JavaScript, demonstrating early versions to stakeholders and refining it through their feedback before company-wide adoption

Added sales-opportunity alerts, client-interaction records, relationship visualisation and backend linking

  • JavaScript
  • Google Apps Script
  • Stakeholder feedback

Experience

August 2020 – September 2026 · London

Galatea Associates

Financial Software Engineer

Built client platforms and internal products with Java, React and TypeScript

  • Built stateless Java/Cassandra REST services for payment lifecycles, with business rules and entitlement checks controlling state changes
  • Managed monthly releases and production support, restoring operational UIs and tracing timeouts through application services and Cassandra
  • Led recurring client delivery calls and documented changes with write-ups, diagrams and walkthroughs
  • Qualified as a technical interview lead and ran full-day coding and system-design assessments

Sep 2019 – Aug 2020 · Newbury

Micro Focus

Graduate Software Engineer

Worked in the core technology team on Enterprise Developer and Visual COBOL for Visual Studio, contributing to the tools developers used to build, run and debug COBOL applications

  • Developed runtime, compiler and debugger components in Java, C and COBOL
  • Worked on the benchmarking system to measure performance and investigate compatibility issues
  • Developed RESTful web-service functionality

Summers 2011 – 2018 · London

CIPFA

Seasonal Data Analyst

Returned to CIPFA over several summers, working on data collection, analysis and reporting tools for local authorities

  • Built Excel survey forms and VBA macros to collect council and constituency data and turn submissions into reports
  • Contributed to a nearest-neighbour model that helped subscribing councils compare spending and other metrics with statistically similar authorities
  • Used Power BI for public-sector analysis and reporting, helping prepare and finalise reports
  • Maintained DataShare and InstantAtlas tools for sharing data, visualising results and comparing authorities geographically

Skills

Frontend & product

React, TypeScript, JavaScript, Redux, Material UI, AG Grid, SVG, HTML, CSS, Webpack

Backend & services

Java, Spring Boot, WebFlux, Reactor, concurrency, REST APIs, Python, workflow orchestration

Data & performance

Oracle SQL, JDBC, Cassandra, CockroachDB, R2DBC, Redis, batching, P99 latency analysis

Identity & security

OpenID Connect, Keycloak, Vault, mutual TLS, JWKS, signing-key rotation

Testing & quality

Jest, React Testing Library, Spring Boot Test, Mockito, Testcontainers, JSON specification tests, JMeter, BlazeMeter

Infrastructure & delivery

AWS Lambda, EC2, EventBridge, CloudWatch, Docker Compose, Kubernetes, Git, Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Geneos

Other projects, education and awards

StormX · Ambassador · 2022

Staking and governance automation

Built two Python bots alongside my full-time role, using AWS Lambda, StormX REST, Snapshot GraphQL and Twitter APIs to publish daily staking statistics and governance updates

I scheduled runs with EventBridge and used Systems Manager Parameter Store with boto3 to compare metrics between runs, publishing updates through Tweepy

University of Bristol · Master’s project

CloudStrikeBot

Built a cloud-security simulation tool to study attacks on cloud services and databases, recording outcomes and the conditions that enabled them before examining mitigations

Earlier mathematics research explored optimal control in queueing systems using Markov chains and stochastic models

Education

MEng Mathematics and Computer Science

University of Bristol · 2014–2019

Studies included cyber security and cryptography, with a thesis on simulated attacks on cloud computing and databases

Awards & competitions

  • Facebook UK Regional Hackathon winner

    2017 · Conceived Tracks and led the winning team: a JavaScript web app mapping Spotify songs to regions, paired with an iOS app that played them by location

    At the Menlo Park finals, our team built PartyBot, a Ruby-based Messenger jukebox and media manager linked to Facebook events, allowing guests to submit media from the event

  • Fintan Darragh Prize

    2019 · Awarded by the University of Bristol for outstanding contribution to departmental life

  • BAE Systems Capture the Flag · Second place

    2019 · Reverse engineering, web exploitation and forensics

Engineering community

Built a frontend knowledge-sharing community and gave multiple technical presentations from 2020 to 2026, while mentoring and onboarding colleagues to help them understand unfamiliar systems and work independently

Founded Galatea’s Diversity and Inclusion committee and served on office, social and recruiting committees

Contact

LinkedIn GitHub