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Matthew Kraus

The one they call
when production is down.

30+ years solving the problems other people escalate to me. 17 years at Fiserv as the last line of defense for 300+ financial institutions. I led the bridge calls. I built the automation. I mentored the team. And when I left, I didn't stop building.

Williamstown, NJ loading 856-397-6792 LinkedIn
"Multi-person, multi-day operations" One person. A few hours. My script.
30+
Years in IT
17
Years at Fiserv
300+
FI Clients
100+
Servers
5
Shipped since
What I built after they let me go

epc-backend

Node.js · Express.js · Redis · Turso/LibSQL · eBay API · RapidAPI

Production REST API on Fly.io. Auth, rate limiting, data quality gate, eBay integration, Redis caching, SQL persistence. Not a tutorial project — it's deployed, it's running, it handles real traffic.

Live

RealShift

Next.js 14 · TypeScript · Prisma · Neon PostgreSQL · Vercel · realshift.app

Full SaaS platform. 104 job profiles. AI resume matching with gap analysis. Career DNA Quiz. Python Character Studio running FLUX.2 image generation locally with LoRA-trained characters and FFmpeg video assembly. The whole stack. Built by one person.

Dev

MaxBuyIQ

Swift · SwiftUI · Vision · Core ML · eBay OAuth · MVVM

Native iOS — barcode scanning, OCR, on-device ML, eBay OAuth. Not SwiftUI from a YouTube tutorial. MVVM with async/await, persistent job queues, real architecture.

QA

AI image pipeline

Gemini · Cloud Vision · dHash

Parallel recognition across multiple AI providers. Confidence merging, fuzzy dedup, automated brand inference.

RationMe

Swift · SwiftUI · SwiftData · WatchConnectivity

iOS + Apple Watch. Adaptive scheduling, pattern analytics, bidirectional device comms.

Automation — because I refuse to do things twice

Threads automation

n8n · Ollama · Threads API

AI reply drafts via local LLM, human approval gate, dedup logic, automated token renewal. Runs unattended.

Job search pipeline

n8n · Indeed RSS · Ollama · ntfy.sh

Multi-source discovery, dedup, geo-filter, AI resume tailoring per posting, push alerts. Be first. Apply fast.

AI-assisted engineering

Claude Code · ChatGPT · NotebookLM · Ollama

Hundreds of hours. Code gen, debugging, API integration, architecture decisions. AI is a force multiplier — I use it like one.

Local AI inference

FLUX.2 Klein · Google TTS · Suno AI · M4 128GB

All image generation runs on my machine. LoRA training, TTS, music gen. No cloud GPU bill. No dependencies.

Career — 30 years, zero gaps
IT Services Administrator, StaffSep 2007 — Nov 2024
Fiserv, Inc. (formerly Open Solutions) · Remote — Berkeley Heights, NJ

The person they paged at 2 AM when 300 financial institutions were waiting. Led P1/P2 bridge calls — coordinating dev, DBA, network, and infrastructure teams in real time. Managed 60–100+ servers across multiple data centers. Built the automation that made multi-day operations take hours. Splunk, Datadog, ServiceNow, Jira, ITIL. Mentored every junior engineer who came through the team. Conducted technical interviews because they trusted my judgment.

17 years. Same company. They kept promoting the scope because I kept delivering.
Software Engineer IIAug 2000 — Dec 2006
Thomson Reuters (formerly ISI) · Philadelphia, PA

Perl and C data pipelines on UNIX. Automated document delivery at scale. High-volume database loading for scientific publications. The kind of backend work that only breaks when nobody's maintaining it.

Programmer / Analyst1997 — 2000
CA Technology (Controlled Access) · Moorestown, NJ

Socket server daemons. GUI clients. Informix stored procedures. C and ESQL/C on UNIX and Windows. Client-facing support — where I learned that the best code means nothing if the person on the other end can't use it.

Support → QA → Maintenance Programmer1994 — 1997
Stores Automated Systems Inc. (SASI) · Bristol, PA

Started on the phones supporting POS systems. Got promoted to QA. Then to the TAC Team — the people they called when support couldn't solve it. Then to programmer. Three promotions in three years. The pattern started here.

Three promotions. Three years. They kept moving me up because I kept solving what others couldn't.
The toolkit

ITSM & Monitoring

ServiceNowJiraSplunkDatadogNew Relic

Databases

SQL ServerOracleInformixPostgreSQLSQLite

Languages

PowerShellBashPerlSQLCPythonTypeScriptSwift

Infrastructure

AnsibleDockerVMwareTomcatGitRHELAIX

Web & Frameworks

Next.jsReactExpress.jsFastAPITailwindPrisma

AI & ML

Claude CodeFLUX.2GeminiCloud VisionCore MLOllamaLoRA

Networking

DNSF5TCP/IPSSL/TLSWireshark

Practices

ITILIncident MgmtDR TestingChange MgmtRCA
The quick fit

Targeting these roles

Senior Application Support Engineer
Application Support Engineer
IT Operations Engineer
Senior Production Support Engineer
Senior Systems Administrator
Platform Operations Engineer

Location & availability

Remote Yes
On-site / Hybrid South NJ / Phila area
Start date Immediately
Work auth U.S. Citizen
Contract / FTE Either

Proof of work

Active projects 5
In production 1 (API on Fly.io)
In QA testing 1 (iOS app)
In development 3
Your browser
Your OS

Your team needs a problem solver.

Application Support · IT Operations · Production Support · Platform Engineering. On-site, hybrid, or remote in Greater Philadelphia / South Jersey. I'll make your systems more reliable than they've ever been.