david chong

Entrepreneur | Ex-Microsoft SWE

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

About

Former Microsoft. Now hopeful founder. I’m using this space to share my entrepreneurial journey in real time; from ideation to execution. My goal is to build transparently, learn publicly, and connect with others who believe in creating with intention.

Experience

  • Senior Software Engineer at Microsoft
    Dec 2022 - Sep 2025 · 2 yrs 10 mos

    • Leading multiple projects from inception to production • Currently creating a web solution to replace an existing public facing solution with the focus on security first (C# .NET, React) • Currently leading a team to deliver an AI solution for first round support; reducing support staff costs by deflecting support cases (CloudGPT) • Worked on a team to deliver an AI solution for Microsoft product recommendations for internal staff to accelerate their workflow (Python, C# .NET and React) • Currently leading development to leverage the above core AI engine solution for another team’s use case

  • Portfolio BI (New York, United States)
    • Lead Product Engineer
      May 2021 - Sep 2022 · 1 yr 5 mos

      • Leading a team of 9 employees to migrate a Windows based trading and portfolio management software from on premises to Azure • Made resource allocation and roadmap decisions to successfully navigate client deadlines and important internal milestones during turbulent times • Made design changes to improve the performance of the tax lot and pricing back-end services by 50%

    • Senior Product Engineer
      Feb 2020 - May 2021 · 1 yr 4 mos

      • Designed and built a scalable ETL web tool with dynamically generated front-end components driven by json data in the database • ETL tool is being used by 3 clients and growing • Implemented critical portfolio management features to ensure the successful closing of client contracts • Developed integrations with third party platforms (ie. Bloomberg/DTCC) • Developed and improved CI/CD processes on TeamCity/Octopus • Directly communicated with clients to gather and translate requirements

  • ACA Technology Solutions (3 yrs 6 mos)
    • Senior Product Engineer
      Jul 2019 - Jan 2020 · 7 mos

    • Product Engineer
      Apr 2019 - Jun 2019 · 3 mos

    • Consultant
      Jan 2017 - Apr 2019 · 2 yrs 4 mos

      - Work on full life cycle projects to design, develop and implement research, trading and portfolio management software (C#, SQL) - Meet with business end-users to establish detailed requirements for sucessful capture and understanding for design of effective applications - Agile development (Confluence, JIRA, Team City, Octopus)

  • Research and Development Software Developer at International Financial Data Services Canada
    Sep 2013 - Dec 2013 · 4 mos

    Developed MapReduce code in Java for a large scale project dealing with Big Data. Created and developed 3D visualization web tools (webGL) using Javascript (THREE.js). These web tools also interfaced with tools such as Oculus Rift and Leap Motion. Also recorded training material for some of the tools I've created to be viewed by future interns.

  • Embedded Systems Test Developer at BlackBerry
    Jan 2013 - May 2013 · 5 mos

    Developed existing test framework and created new test cases in Python. Designed and created reporting tool for test case results in ASP.NET, C#, Javascript (jQuery), SQL.