I'm a technical co-founder building a B2C generative AI startup (currently in stealth). Before that, I spent 8 years at Google building the modern YouTube.com frontend and backend, serving on the core web committee, and shipping major product features. I then spent 4 years at Waymo as an L6 engineer focusing on ML/generative AI systems and was part of the San Francisco autonomous vehicle rollout.

I'm also the creator behind one of the most popular open-weight text-to-image models (300M+ generations, 1M+ downloads - I'll share which one when we chat).

Over my 12 years in big tech, I climbed from L3→L4→L5→L6 and conducted 100+ technical interviews.

🎯 What I Can Help You With

💼 If you're aiming for roles at top tech companies:
🦄 Breaking into FAANG/top-tier companies (L3 through L6)
🦄 Technical interview preparation (systems design, coding, behavioral)
🦄 Understanding what matters for leveling and promotions
🦄 Navigating culture and org dynamics at Google (YouTube vs. Cloud vs. Ads are very different internally)
🦄 Hiring strategy: getting hired at senior levels vs. how AI tools are changing junior expectations
🦄 Career pathing and strategic moves
🦄 International hiring and US immigration (directly hired from Russia to Google - happy to discuss recent H-1B changes)
🦄 Relocating to the Bay Area and navigating tech hubs
🦄 Direct referrals and introductions to FAANG companies and leading Gen AI/Robotics startups for strong candidates

🚀 If you're building an AI/ML startup:
🦄 Technical architecture for generative AI products at scale
🦄 Navigating the AI tech landscape: choosing models, APIs, hosting, and avoiding expensive mistakes
🦄 Training and deploying large models
🦄 Setting up technical foundations: infrastructure and tooling
🦄 Hiring your first technical team
🦄 Co-founder dynamics and division of responsibilities
🦄 Balancing product velocity with technical excellence
🦄 Fundraising preparation from a technical founder's perspective

✨ My Approach

I adapt to what you need - tactical interview prep, strategic career guidance, or technical architecture discussions. I'm direct when you need honest feedback, supportive when you need encouragement.

💡 Fun fact: If you use dark mode on YouTube, I built that. I also led the world's largest WebP rollout - as featured in Ars Technica https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/04/cheaper-bandwidth-or-bust-how-google-saved-youtube/

🎥 See me explain the YouTube.com rebuild: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4l86SKBtMs