I'm Haris Khan. I have 18 years in product engineering, almost 17 of them at dubizzle Group, most recently as Director of Engineering, growing a team from 50 to 100+ people and keeping platforms with 5M+ monthly users running at 99.998% uptime. Over the last year I've led AI adoption in engineering and built AI tools myself. Now I work with founder-led startups and mid-stage companies in a growth or scale-up phase, especially product companies and marketplaces.
I know how to start small. I built a 60-person remote hub from scratch, and I like to begin with a short, fixed-scope piece of work.
You can start with any one of these, and some engagements grow into longer ones. I don't publish prices because the scope varies. Book a call and I'll give you a clear fee after one conversation.
Technical leadership for founder-led companies, without a full-time hire.
def fractional_cto(team, founders) -> Mandate:
Good fit ifYou have a product and a small team but no senior technical voice, or you're not sure whether to build, buy or hire.
Typical1-2 days/week
3 months or more
A clear, plain-language view of technical risk.
def due_diligence(system, team) -> Report:
Good fit ifYou're raising money, selling or buying a company, or inheriting a system you don't fully understand.
TypicalFixed scope
2-3 weeks
Use AI to get more done, without putting company data at risk.
def govern_ai(models, data) -> Policy:
Good fit ifPeople in your company are already using AI tools and you don't have clear rules, or leaders want the productivity without losing control.
TypicalFixed scope
4-8 weeks
Hire, structure and grow engineering teams, including remote hubs in other countries.
def build_team(roles, locations) -> Hub:
Good fit ifYou need to hire and grow an engineering team, open a remote hub, or turn a handful of engineers into a structured organisation.
TypicalFixed scope
or ongoing
Keep delivery steady while you find the right permanent leader.
def stabilise(team, delivery) -> Team:
Good fit ifYour engineering leader has left, you're restructuring, or the team needs stabilising.
Typical3-5 days/week
3-6 months
Lower your technology costs without hurting delivery.
def review_vendors(contracts, spend) -> Plan:
Good fit ifYour cloud and tooling spend is growing faster than the business.
TypicalFixed fee
or savings share
Where are you today?
Pick the line that sounds most like you.
AI has raised how much code a team can write. The constraint is getting it to production without hurting quality. This is how I approach it.
A person writes it, with AI help. Small and scoped, so it can be reviewed properly.
Critical paths are covered. A failing test stops the line.
AI review plus a person. Higher-risk areas always get a person.
A feature flag or canary, so a bad change reaches few users first.
Production bugs and uptime are monitored, and a rollback is ready.
A few things I built or ran. I describe the outcome, not the client.
Built an AI-based hub that extracts documentation from code repositories and generates architecture diagrams and maps of services and third-party integrations.
ResultUsed to onboard new joiners, and later to give AI coding assistants a condensed view of the codebase.
Championed AI-assisted development across an engineering department: built the tooling myself, demoed it to the team and set a goal to double pull-request throughput in six months while holding quality.
ResultAI-assisted development moved from a few individual users to standard practice.
Led delivery of AI search, AI-assisted listing creation and a conversational assistant on a high-traffic marketplace.
ResultAI features on a platform serving 5M+ monthly users.
Built a tool on top of the bot-mitigation firewall that reads web server logs, uses visitor fingerprints to find usage patterns and scores potential fraud.
ResultSuspicious usage is flagged and scored from the logs.
Built a 60-person remote engineering hub from scratch, alongside the existing team.
ResultAdded 60 engineers while keeping delivery and platform uptime steady.
Moved a desktop-focused monolith to an event-based, service-oriented architecture, and later migrated all services to a new region while keeping the platform available.
ResultRelease frequency more than doubled, with 5M+ monthly users at 99.998% uptime.
More detail is available on a call. Details of employer and client work stay private unless agreed.
Over 18 years in product engineering, I went from junior web developer to Director of Engineering. I scaled teams from 50 to 100+ people, built a 60-person remote hub from scratch, kept platforms serving 5M+ monthly users at 99.998% uptime, and later took on group-wide Business IT and cybersecurity, including security governance and Zero Trust controls, and led the disaster recovery that moved all services to a new region while keeping the platform available.
Over the last two years my focus has been AI. I led delivery of AI search, AI-assisted listing creation and a conversational assistant, championed AI-assisted development across the engineering department, and built two internal tools myself: a documentation hub and a bot and scraping detection tool. I'm positive about what AI can do for a team, and I care that it ships safely, with good review, reliable tests and staged releases.
I work with founder-led startups and mid-stage companies in a growth or scale-up phase, especially product companies and marketplaces. I start small: the first engagement is a short, fixed-scope piece of work, and we decide from there whether to continue.
The first engagement is small on purpose. It gives us both a clear view before either side commits.
Pick a time. We spend 30 minutes on the problem, the context and what a good outcome looks like. No deck and no obligation.
I send a short written scope: the outcome, the work, the fee and a start date. You approve it before anything begins.
We start with the smallest useful piece, usually a short diagnostic or a weekly cadence. If it is not a fit, we stop there.
If yours is not here, ask it on the call or send a message.
I'm based in Adelaide. I work across AU, APAC and MENA, and calls are scheduled in your time zone.
Fractional CTO work is typically one to two days a week. Head of engineering work is three to five days a week. We agree the cadence in writing before we start.
Yes. I keep client and employer work confidential and do not publish names, numbers or details without permission.
A short written agreement covering scope, fee, notice and intellectual property. Most engagements start with a fixed-scope piece or a three-month minimum, then continue with agreed notice.
Yes. I've worked with distributed teams across time zones for most of my career, and I work remotely by default.
Book a 30-minute call or send a message. Both come to me, and I reply within two working days.