Al EmranSoftware Architect
Let’s talk

Available for remote projects & engineering roles

  • CTO & Product Owner for 4+ years across 4 SaaS products, from empty repo to paying users.
  • Product thinker: I start from the user’s problem and the business metric it moves, and write the spec before any code.
  • Built 9+ SaaS products inside one all-in-one platform (Doplac CRM), before the AI era: cold outreach, email marketing & automation, website & funnel builder, calendar booking, project management, team inbox and more. Grew it from 0 to 3,000 active users.
  • Built an AI agent at NO-BS, Smart Campaign: RAG, vector DB, tool calling and function calling over live product data.
  • AI-assisted engineering: I use coding agents with a spec-driven and compound-engineering workflow, so AI-written code stays reviewable and reusable.
  • Now building Compel.ad as CTO / Product Owner, the ad platform for AI visibility: brands buy placements on the publisher sites AI and search engines cite, then track how those placements change what AI says about them.
Chat on WhatsApp

Dhaka, Bangladesh · Works remotely across time zones

Portrait of Al Emran, software architect and full-stack engineer in Dhaka

Al Emran 10+ years Full Stack Engineer & Software Architect in Dhaka

LinkedIn
Products I’ve owned or built at
  • Compel.ad
  • NO-BS Marketplace
  • Doplac CRM
  • UIHUT
  • Figlab
  • XpeedStudio
  • weDevs
Selected work

Outcomes, not outputs.

Three products where I owned the decisions and the numbers. Each one started with a question about users or data, and ended with a result someone could measure.

01NO-BS MarketplaceProduct Owner / CTO2025 — now

Cut server costs by 88% while making the product 2–3× faster.

Problem
API responses were crawling past 600ms, concurrency was capped, and a $500/month infrastructure bill was growing faster than revenue.
Approach
  • Ran a performance analysis to find where time and money were actually going
  • Prioritised a rebuild around the slowest, most-used paths
  • Validated outcomes with SQL-based reporting and stakeholder feedback
Outcome
Response times dropped to 200–300ms, the monthly bill fell to $60, and the platform now handles more concurrent users on less hardware.
Performance analysisCost reductionSQL reporting
API response time2–3× faster
Before
600ms+
After
200–300ms
lower is better
Monthly server cost−88%
Before
$500
After
$60
USD

+ higher concurrent-user capacity on the same traffic

02Doplac CRMCo-founder · Product Owner / CTO2023 — now

Took a multi-tenant CRM from zero to 3,000 active users, and to acquisition.

Problem
A CRM competes on breadth, and breadth is where scope drift kills small teams. Fourteen modules had to ship without the product losing its shape.
Approach
  • Wrote PRDs and specs, validated with founders and customers before any build
  • Synthesised user feedback and usage patterns to sequence the modules
  • Reported platform health, adoption and delivery velocity to stakeholders
Outcome
3,000 active users across 14+ modules, including email marketing, automation, live chat and billing, with requirements that held. Doplac CRM was acquired.
Product discoveryPRDs & specsRoadmap prioritisation
Acquired3,000active users, from a standing start
Modules shipped14+

Email marketingAutomationLive chatBilling+10 more

Multi-tenant, sequenced by user feedback and usage data.

03UIHUTCTO2022 — 2024

Led the roadmap of a SaaS marketplace through to acquisition.

Problem
A digital-download marketplace needed search people trusted, subscription billing that just worked, and fast asset delivery worldwide.
Approach
  • Owned product requirements and the roadmap end to end
  • Shipped search, subscription billing and CDN-backed delivery
  • Kept the product legible and stable enough to be diligence-ready
Outcome
UIHUT was acquired in 2024.
Roadmap ownershipSubscriptionsMarketplace
  1. 2022Joined as CTO, owned requirements & roadmap
  2. ·Search, subscription billing, CDN-backed delivery
  3. 2024Acquired
Work with me

Two ways in.

Hiring for an architect or CTO-level engineering role, or need someone to own a product build for a while? Pick your door.

For hiring managers

A software architect who has owned the product, not just the code.

I have been CTO and product owner across four SaaS products, so I design systems with the business metric in mind and know what a requirement costs to build.

  • Architecture for multi-tenant SaaS: clean, scalable and built to be maintained
  • Hands-on full-stack delivery in Laravel, Node.js, Vue/Nuxt and React
  • Specs and roadmaps engineers can build from, tied to the metric they move
  • Technical leadership: code review, hiring input and a team that ships
Software ArchitectCTOFull-Stack Lead
Talk about a role
For founders & teams

Someone to own the product, not just the tickets.

Bring me in when you need clarity on what to build, a product taken from spec to launch, or a platform that costs too much and runs too slow.

  • Product discovery sprint: user interviews, data review, a prioritised roadmap
  • MVP to launch: spec, build and ship a SaaS product end to end
  • Performance & cost audit: find the bottlenecks and cut the bill
  • AI features: RAG, semantic search and LLM agents on your product data
DiscoveryMVP buildAudit
Start a project
Specialisations

What I can build for you.

How I work

Write it down. Then build it.

Every non-trivial change starts as a written spec with a metric attached. It keeps engineers, founders and AI tooling pointed at the same outcome, and makes the result easy to judge.

  1. 01

    Discover

    Talk to users, read the data, and find the job the product is really being hired for.

  2. 02

    Define

    Turn findings into a written spec with KPIs, and close every open question before building.

  3. 03

    Deliver

    Ship in small, reviewable increments. I can build it myself, so specs are grounded in reality.

  4. 04

    Measure

    Track adoption and funnels after launch, report honestly, and feed it into the next cycle.

Experience

Ten years, one thread: owning the outcome.

From teaching web development to owning SaaS products as a CTO, the job has always been the same: understand the problem, then make it measurably better.

  1. Jul 2025 — Present

    Product Owner / CTO · NO-BS Marketplace

    Discovery, specs, delivery and post-launch iteration. Campaign automation with prospect scoring and personalised outreach.

  2. Oct 2023 — Present

    Product Owner / CTO · Doplac CRM

    Co-founder & CTO until Apr 2025. Multi-tenant CRM, 0 → 3,000 active users, 14+ modules. Acquired.

  3. Aug 2022 — Aug 2024

    CTO · UIHUT

    Requirements and roadmap for a digital-download SaaS marketplace. Acquired 2024.

  4. May 2021 — Apr 2022

    Senior Software Engineer · XpeedStudio

    Requirements and architecture for ShopEngine, ElementsKit and MetForm, widely installed WordPress products.

  5. Jul 2020 — Feb 2021

    Software Engineer · weDevs

    Built the WP ERP Accounting module: ledger, reconciliation and financial reporting.

  6. Apr 2019 — Jul 2020

    Senior Full-Stack Developer · ChatLeads (WebAble)

    Chatbot, Zapier/Twilio/Google Calendar integrations, onboarding and analytics.

  7. 2016 — 2019

    Founder, developer & trainer · Babshaye.com, Unique Group, Padma Bridge Rail Link / DORP, PeopleNTech

    Built an SME e-commerce SaaS solo, management systems, and resettlement software for a national infrastructure programme.

Recognition

  • Winner, NASA Space Apps Challenge2017
  • Featured in Daily Kaler Kantho & Daily ShuprovatLibrary automation software, University of Chittagong
  • Convener, BASIS Student ForumUniversity of Chittagong, 2015–16
  • Executive Member, Mozilla BangladeshChittagong, 2015

Education

  • BA, Arabic Language & LiteratureUniversity of Chittagong, 2011–2014
  • Diploma in Computer ScienceInternational Islamic University Chittagong, 2013
  • Training of Trainers (TOT)ICT Ministry, Government of Bangladesh
Open source

Tools I built and gave away.

Small, useful libraries and starters from years of full-stack work.

Currently buildingFlying WorkerA Laravel-inspired DX framework for Cloudflare Workers, built on Hono.
Technical writing

Engineering articles on Dev.to: Dependency injection in PHP · PHP architecture & design patterns · Framework design · Laravel & backend development · Developer experience (DX).

All repositories on GitHub
Toolkit

Architect’s view, builder’s hands.

I can write the query, the spec and the code. That means fewer handoffs, faster answers, and an architecture that already accounts for how the product will be built and run.

Product & analysis

  • Requirements gathering
  • PRDs & specs
  • Roadmap prioritisation
  • Funnel analysis
  • KPI tracking
  • Experimentation
  • User feedback synthesis
  • Stakeholder alignment

Data & reporting

  • SQL
  • MySQL
  • PostgreSQL
  • Redis
  • MongoDB
  • Spreadsheet dashboards
  • Vector stores

Build

  • TypeScript
  • Vue / Nuxt
  • React / Next.js
  • Laravel
  • Node.js
  • Hono
  • REST API design

Infra & AI

  • Cloudflare Workers
  • Docker
  • CI/CD
  • Nginx / Caddy
  • RAG pipelines
  • LLM agents
  • MCP servers
FAQ

Quick answers.

Who is Al Emran?

Al Emran is a software architect and full-stack engineer based in Dhaka, Bangladesh, with 10+ years of experience. He has been CTO and product owner across four SaaS products, two of which (Doplac CRM and UIHUT) were acquired.

What does Al Emran do?

He designs and builds SaaS products, AI automation and agents (RAG, tool calling, MCP servers), custom ERP software and ecommerce systems, and acts as a hands-on CTO or technical lead for founders and teams.

Where is Al Emran based, and does he work remotely?

He is based in Dhaka, Bangladesh (Asia/Dhaka timezone) and works remotely with clients across time zones, using written updates and a shared staging link.

What products has Al Emran built?

Doplac CRM, an all-in-one multi-tenant platform grown from 0 to 3,000 active users; UIHUT, a subscription marketplace; NO-BS Marketplace, where he cut server costs by 88% and built the Smart Campaign AI agent; and Compel.ad, the ad platform for AI visibility, which he is building now.

Which technologies does Al Emran use?

PHP and Laravel, Node.js, TypeScript and Hono on the back end; Vue/Nuxt and React/Next.js on the front end; MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis and vector stores; Docker, CI/CD and Cloudflare Workers; and RAG pipelines, LLM agents and MCP servers for AI.

How can I hire Al Emran?

Message him on WhatsApp at +880 1766 603578 or email emrancu1@gmail.com with a short description of what you are building. He usually replies within one working day.

Contact

Have a project in mind?

Tell me what you’re building, or the role you’re hiring for. I usually reply within one working day.

Email me LinkedIn GitHub Dev.to