Hello, I am
Farooq Haider
Software Engineering Manager | Distributed Systems | Applied AI
I build and lead teams behind large-scale distributed systems. I love developing innovative products, solving hard problems, and exploring new technologies, with a masters in distributed systems and a founders instinct for shipping.
Who I am
With 12+ years of hands-on engineering experience and a master's degree in distributed systems, I thrive on technical challenges and on fostering a culture of continuous improvement. Over the past few years I have also gained valuable managerial experience , growing engineers, shaping roadmaps, and staying close enough to the code to be useful.
My path has taken me from Lahore to Darmstadt, Dublin, Cologne, and now the US, as an engineer at Ericsson, a co-founder and CTO in Germany, and today a senior staff engineer and manager at Ordergroove. Along the way I have grown into managing and mentoring engineers, while staying close enough to the code to be useful.
What drives me
I love building scalable, reliable systems with clean architecture, and code that lasts.
I think in outcomes first, shaping engineering work around real user and business impact.
I experiment with AI to build agents, streamline workflows and boost team productivity
My Experience
Ordergroove Inc - New York, USA
Senior Staff Software Engineer → Software Engineering Manager
Leading a team of 4-5 engineers, building the services that power core platform partnerships, including Shopify, BigCommerce, and Klaviyo, as part of the enablement pillar
- Designed and architected scalable solutions from the ground up, handling 10M+ events and placing up to 1M+ orders daily
- Decomposed a monolithic application into a set of microservices
- Achieved 99.9% uptime across all services with robust monitoring, alerting, and logging
- Hands-on shipped key features like Shopify Subscriptions and billing cycles, driving 30% of new GMV
- Led implementation of billing cycles, that has improved our order placement throughput by 50%+ for key clients
- Built the design and implementation of our payments solution using Spreedly for a frictionless experience
- Spearheaded multicurrency, enabling orders across multiple markets with local pricing and dynamic price calculations
- Developed MCP server support for seamless AI agent integrations with partner platforms
- Stack: Python, Django, Angular, Celery, Kubernetes, JavaScript, Node
Hypd (Ticketrunner GmbH) - Cologne, Germany
CTO / Lead Software Engineer
Cofounded and built a peer-to-peer marketing service enabling festivals and brands to increase customer engagement by up to 20% using their most loyal fans.
- Secured $1M in seed funding by showcasing tech-driven growth strategies
- Rolled out the product across major festivals and soccer clubs e.g FC Schalke and integrating with Eventbrite, Ticketmaster, and key ticketing partners
- Built and led a team of 5 engineers, owning architecture, code reviews, and product roadmap
- Shipped features such as live sales tracking with hands-on coding, and developed gamification for loyal ambassadors
- Stack: Ruby, Rails, EC2, Jenkins, Graylog, Passenger, AWS S3, Stripe
Ericsson Ltd - Dublin, Ireland
Software Development Engineer
Worked as part of the Microsoft IPTV Mediaroom product team, acquired by Ericsson.
- Developed next-gen Cloud TV platform across STB native layer, DVR/DRM, and encoding/license services
- Spearheaded prototyping and technical leadership for Timeshifting TV, a key viewer-engagement feature
- Stack: C++, Boost, Media Pipeline, CMake, GMock, Azure, TypeScript
Redmath Pvt Limited - Lahore, Pakistan
Associate Software Engineer
Early-career engineering role where I cut my teeth on production software development for banks
Education & Honors
Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences
Darmstadt, Germany
08/2013 - 09/2014
Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS)
GPA 3.52 / 4.0
09/2011 - 06/2013
National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences (FAST-NU)
Lahore, Pakistan
2006 - 2010
- Scrum Master Training by Scrum Alliance
- Managerial and technical leadership training programs
- Agentic AI courses
EU-funded Erasmus Mundus Scholarship
Fully funded scholarship to study in the European Union. Selected as one of a handful of students from Pakistan for graduate studies
Dean's List for Master's Program
Skills & Interests
Core skills
Languages
- EnglishNative
- UrduNative
- GermanAdvanced
Interests
- Distributed systems and large-scale architecture
- Startups, entrepreneurship, and early-stage product
- Mentoring engineers and building healthy teams
- New technologies and continuous learning
- Travel and living across cultures
Industries I have worked in
E-commerce
Subscription commerce, platform integrations, and high-volume order systems at Ordergroove.
Events & Entertainment
Peer-to-peer marketing and ticketing tech for festivals, soccer clubs, and major brands at Hypd.
TV Streaming
Cloud TV, DVR, DRM, and media pipeline engineering for next-gen IPTV platforms at Ericsson.
Banking
Production systems and financial software development early in my career at Redmath.
Other Projects
ItechGarage
Independent , founded during my master's
Founded a tech services company while studying and freelanced 10K+ hours with US and UK based firms including Devfactory, Timevizor, Majoron, and Celmatix. Led the growth of an offshore team of multiple engineers.
Academic work
Research, teaching, and systems projects
- Visiting faculty for Computer Networks, running the CS undergraduate networks lab
- Developed D-Kernel in Operating Systems: a new scheduling policy for the kernel
- Compiler construction: built an interpreter for a new C-like language
- Multicore processor programming and distributed systems with Intel TBB
- User-interactive web search and data indexing using a vertical space model
Featured on LinkedIn
A few thoughts I have shared recently on LinkedIn.
One of the things I love most about Ordergroove is the culture: it’s dynamic, fast-paced, and built on trust. Low ego, high impact, and a team that’s genuinely fun to work with.
View on LinkedInGet in touch
I am always open to interesting conversations, collaboration opportunities, or just saying hello.