ALBARA HASSAN Senior Backend Engineer. Python, FastAPI, PostgreSQL and LLM systems. Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Remote, CET (UTC+1). albara.m.hassan@gmail.com | albarahassan.com | linkedin.com/in/albara-m-hassan | github.com/AlbaraHassan SUMMARY ------- Senior Backend Engineer with 5 years building production Python services on FastAPI, PostgreSQL and asyncio. Currently owns a production RAG pipeline on Azure and OpenAI for a UK benefits platform, answering in under 3 seconds over 500+ documents, and cut slow API responses from 20 seconds to under 2. Strong in rule-driven SaaS backends, third-party integrations, query optimization, pytest-driven testing, and serverless pipelines on AWS and Azure. SKILLS ------ Languages: Python, TypeScript, Swift Backend: FastAPI, REST APIs, asyncio, Node.js, OAuth2, RBAC AI / LLM: OpenAI API, RAG, LangChain, Embeddings, Vector search Data: PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Azure Cosmos DB Cloud and DevOps: Azure Functions, AWS Lambda, Step Functions, Docker, GitHub Actions, CI/CD Testing and Frontend: pytest, React EXPERIENCE ---------- Kinly | Senior Backend Engineer Aug 2025 to present | Remote | UK benefits platform: Python, FastAPI, Azure, Cosmos DB, OpenAI - Own the knowledge-base RAG pipeline end to end (Azure Functions ingestion and embedding, Cosmos DB vector search, OpenAI-backed FastAPI): 500+ documents indexed, answers in under 3 s. - Scheduled ingestion for freshness: hourly incremental ingest plus a weekly full resync and external web crawl, staggered into the lowest-traffic window. - Eliminated latency spikes for ~270 users by tuning the API and adding a second uvicorn worker: windows with p95 over 2 s fell from up to 13 a day to 0, business-hour p95 from 1.0-1.7 s to 0.5-0.7 s. - Cut requests over 3 s by 80%+ (up to 3,900 a day down to 469), health-check 503s from up to 30 a day to 0, and autoscale instance churn by half, with no new errors. - Took the slowest endpoints from 20 s to under 2 s by eliminating N+1 queries and tuning database queries and async I/O, guarded by a 1,400+ test pytest suite. - Shipped eligibility-form prepopulation from website enquiries via HubSpot and Cosmos DB: agent-open trigger, config-driven mappings across 8 field groups, and freeze rules that protect agent edits from automation. - Authored the post-incident review for a 65-minute production outage caused by Key Vault references resolving empty after a slot swap, with root cause, recovery runbook and 12 corrective actions. Rayna Corp | Full Stack Engineer Oct 2025 to May 2026 | Remote | TypeScript, Express, TypeORM, React, AWS - Built a dedicated AWS Lambda for TypeORM migrations that runs idempotently at 3 points: every staging deploy, the end of the nightly replication Step Function, and behind an approval gate in production. - Moved migrations off an API Gateway endpoint capped at 30 seconds onto Lambda's 15-minute window, so long schema changes stopped timing out. - Redesigned onboarding for law-firm admin users, replacing two conflicting verification and password emails with a single verify-and-set-password flow. - Shipped platform features across React and Express, including cross-tab cache synchronization and bulk provider connection management. Epiisa | Software Engineer Sep 2021 to Jul 2025 | Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina - E-Advokat (legal AI agent): built a LangChain and ChromaDB RAG pipeline that answers legal questions with citation-level attribution, with OCR ingestion of statutes and court rulings served through FastAPI. - CueLoop (AI email and calendar assistant): built FastAPI services on Google APIs via OAuth2, with LLM draft generation, meeting detection and embedding-based semantic search over email threads. - Engineered an asyncio task engine for minute-level polling and concurrent background jobs across parsing, scheduling and indexing. - Built secure multi-tenant FastAPI services with PostgreSQL and MongoDB schemas, token-based authentication and RBAC. - Designed a dynamic-programming pricing engine that optimizes rental rates from regional usage patterns (Vroomski). - Ran CI/CD with Docker Compose and GitHub Actions, maintained pytest coverage, and delivered Next.js frontends where products needed them. Rapidfacture GmbH | Full Stack Engineer (Contract) Jan 2025 to May 2025 | Remote - Built an e-commerce platform for industrial clients with real-time quoting, part configuration and inventory synchronization. - Automated backend workflows in Python, including CAD file parsing, PDF generation and email handling. - Extended Node.js APIs and a custom CRM, replacing brittle legacy logic with modular, testable services. Epifront | Software Engineer Sep 2023 to Sep 2024 | Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina - Led development of Spacerra, a hosting automation platform offering no-code deployment and generated CI/CD pipelines. - Built modular FastAPI services with PostgreSQL and MongoDB schemas, authentication and RBAC. - Built containerized environments and Git-triggered Docker pipelines with infrastructure-as-code tooling. PROJECTS -------- Indie iOS apps, designed and built solo in Swift: - Kandilj: Prayer times for Bosnia. Accurate vaktija with on-time ezan notifications, under a live sky drawn over your own town. Localized into German and Swedish for diaspora users. (On the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/kandilj-prayer-times-adhan/id6822796520) - Couch: Universal TV remote. Controls Roku, Samsung, LG and Google TV from the iPhone over the local network, with weekly, yearly and lifetime StoreKit plans. (On the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/couch-universal-tv-remote/id6820994768) - Morsel: AI food journal. Resolves free-text meals through personal history, a 13,660-food USDA database and on-device Apple Intelligence, synced via iCloud with no backend. (On the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/morsel-food-journal-macros/id6822028978) - Pilot: Control a Mac from the iPhone. A trackpad, keyboard and remote for your Mac over the local network, with the live trackpad and keyboard as the paid tier. (Coming to the App Store) - Proof: Focus and app blocking. Users set a goal, lock in, then attach proof of what they accomplished. (Launching January 2027) EDUCATION --------- BSc Information Technologies | International Burch University, Sarajevo CERTIFICATIONS -------------- - Machine Learning (Stanford Online) - AI Programming with Python (Udacity, AWS) - AWS Machine Learning Foundations (Udacity, AWS) - Data Analytics with Python (IBM) - Introduction to Back-End Development (Meta) LANGUAGES --------- English (full professional), Arabic (native), Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian (native) PDF: https://albarahassan.com/Albara_Hassan_CV.pdf