Ben Braunstein

Tech Lead at Esusu

New York, New York, United States

About

I’m a software engineering leader with deep experience building and scaling production systems in high-growth fintech environments. As an early engineer and Tech Lead at Esusu, I played a key role in growing the company and building core platforms that support large user bases and integrate with all three major credit bureaus. My work focuses on backend and platform engineering — designing identity resolution systems, data ingestion pipelines, and customer-facing products that operate reliably at scale. I’ve owned critical services end-to-end, led engineering teams, and partnered closely with product, data, and operations to turn complex regulatory and data challenges into dependable software. I care deeply about building systems that are correct, observable, and cost-efficient. I’ve re-architected workflows to improve reliability and significantly reduce operational costs, built internal tools that empower non-engineering teams, and delivered products from concept through production for both enterprise clients and consumers. I began my career in IT and infrastructure automation, which gave me a strong foundation in systems thinking and operational excellence — a mindset that continues to shape how I design software today. I’m especially passionate about mentoring junior engineers and helping them grow into confident, high-impact contributors. Core technologies: Go, TypeScript/JavaScript, React, AWS, MongoDB, relational databases, distributed systems. Contact: [email protected] 516-477-8178

Experience

  • Esusu (6 yrs 3 mos)
    • Tech Lead - Consumer
      Feb 2023 - Present · 3 yrs 6 mos

    • Senior Software Engineer
      Dec 2020 - Feb 2023 · 2 yrs 3 mos

    • Software Engineer
      Oct 2020 - Dec 2020 · 3 mos

  • Software Engineering Graduate at Flatiron School
    May 2019 - Oct 2019 · 6 mos

    Tradr An application to trade unwanted items with others for their unwanted items • Implemented a user interface employing React and Redux with Semantic UI for styling • Developed a Rails API backend with a Postgres database enabling authentication, messaging and trade execution • Utilized the Twilio API to send SMS messages notifying users of incoming trade requests • Applied JSON Web Tokens and localStorage to store encrypted user information client-side • Integrated a live chat system where users can communicate with text and emojis https://tradr-frontend.herokuapp.com/ Giffy Guesser A guessing game using Gifs from your favorite movies and adorable dogs and compete against friends • Implemented a user interface using Ruby on Rails MVC with a Postgres database and Semantic UI for styling. It also enabled users to challenge others and make their way onto the leaderboards • Employs Google’s Tenor API to find Gifs, trending search terms and similar search term suggestions • Developed an administrator area to approve or deny automatically generated questions using various algorithms https://giffyguesser.herokuapp.com/

  • Software Development Intern at Assured Guaranty
    Jul 2018 - Aug 2018 · 2 mos

    • Learned to code in HTML, CSS, JavaScript and C# using the ASP.Net MVC 5 Framework • Designed and wrote code to send Windows Tray notifications to pertinent users when a new alert pertaining to them is created on the company’s system using HTML, JavaScript, C# and SignalR • Attended team meetings such as sprint planning, stand up, sprint review and sprint retrospective where we used Team Foundation Server and Git version control to organize capacity, stories and tasks as well as collaborate on projects together and review each other’s work • Organized training data set to be used for machine learning to decide if incoming wire transfers are premium payments and match premium payments to respective policies and their unique ID numbers using tensorflow.js

  • IT Systems Service Desk Support at Assured Guaranty
    Jun 2017 - Aug 2017 · 3 mos

    Summer Internship • Administered, repaired and updated 400 company computers, printers, monitors and phones • Learned to write scripts using PowerShell for all company computers and trained current employees to create scripts to remotely uninstall and install company software in PowerShell • Designed, updated and validated new company inventory system containing 3,000 assets • Scanned all company computers for installed memory and upgraded memory to 16GB • Installed, tested and modified Windows 10 OS in preparation for company-wide upgrade • Automatically scanned storage space of 450 VDIs each night and erased cache & temporary files to prevent Windows update failures

  • Hardware & Software Technician at Atlaz International LTD
    May 2015 - Aug 2016 · 1 yr 4 mos

    Full-Time Summer and Part-Time School Year Position • Designed, built, assembled, and refurbished upwards of 100 desktop & laptop computers weekly • Provided ongoing on-site and remote technical support to 10 clients by troubleshooting and resolving computer difficulties • Trained 3 new employees to assemble and disassemble computers in order to retrieve the components for use in other machines • Managed inventory of computers in preparation for shipping to clients