Description

I'm a software engineer with 20+ years of experience building and scaling backend systems — from microservices architecture at a Dutch bank to shipping my own AI-powered product end-to-end.

My core stack is Kotlin, Java, and Spring Boot, with deep hands-on experience in Kubernetes, Azure DevOps, event-driven architecture, and cloud migration. I've led teams, mentored developers, and owned delivery from architecture decisions down to production incidents.

Most recently I built PersonalBestPace — an AI cycling coaching platform — entirely solo: backend API, Android app, AI coaching logic, and go-to-market. It gave me a different kind of experience than corporate work: product thinking, user feedback loops, and making every decision yourself.

I'm based in Amstelveen and available for freelance engagements in the Amsterdam area and remote

Languages

Turkish
Native or bilingual
English
Fluent
Dutch
Conversational

Workplace preferences

Can work on-site

Amstelveen (up to 50km)

PersonalBestPace
Founder
SPORTS
November 2025 - Today (7 months)
Amstelveen, Netherlands
Cycling AI coach ,various integration with AI. strava,garmin,wahoo.Cycling training app, with data anlaysis, user feedback, AI application integration .
artificial intelligence Spring boot External API integration Kotlin
Bank Mendes Gans
LEAD DEVOPS DEVELOPER
October 2018 - Today (7 years and 8 months)
• ● Splitting monolith applications into modern microservices and defining border between domains.
• ● Implement CI/CD (Continuous Development) practices on Azure DevOps.
• ● Monitor and analyze runtime and incidents (Kibana,Promoetheus,Servicenow)
• ● Mentor junior developers and improve team capabilities.
• ● Migrate from on premises to open shift/cloud infrastructure.
• ● Design and coordinate cross-team efforts.
• ● Saving application from locks and slowing queries. (CQRS, Event-Driven design)
• ● Establishing "Release testing cycling", making sure test load is also supported by development team.
• ● Improving test coverage and automation quality with TDD and integration tests.
• ● Requirement engineering from legacy code.
• ● Spring-boot, Kubernetes, java 21, Elastic, Prometheus, lit-html,react, webpack, Kotlin, Azure devops, Github Actions
Pegasystems BV-
PRINCIPAL DEVELOPER
July 2010 - September 2018 (8 years and 2 months)
Amsterdam, Netherlands
• ● Design and Prototype System Architecture
• ● Overseeing high-priority problems and customer support
• ● Improve software quality.
• ● Lead development team to prioritize daily work.
• ● Building reusable components for a platform for decisioning platform
• ● Test-Driven Development
• ● Performance testing and profiling.
• ● gradle, git, java, junit, mockito Jenkins, JSON, Cassandra, Hadoop, jmeter, jprofiler, gatling,yourkit

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Certified Scrum Master
2012
Certified Scrum Master
COM PUTER SCIENCE ENGINEERING
Marmara University
2005
COM PUTER SCIENCE ENGINEERING

Mert Akkan

AI integration backend

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