Reed Tomlinson

CTO | Experienced Leader | Programmatic M&A Expert

Reed is an experienced technical leader and CTO with deep experience in high-growth startups from Seed to Series D. His extensive technical knowledge and communication skills allow him to bridge the gap between executive leaders and their technology organizations, translating technological decisions for leadership while instilling a business mindset among engineers. His engagements center around clear outcomes and demonstrated ROI, and his focus is on building organizational core competencies th…

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Work

Trilogy | Portfolio CTO, SVP | M&A
One of a dozen team members in charge of the Trilogy (and ESW Capital) acquisition program. Additionally responsible for planning and overseeing large-scale refactors of legacy platforms into the AWS cloud.
https://trilogy.com/
Octerra | CTO
Octerra is a MarTech SaaS platform. After rebuilding and repositioning an internal tool as a SaaS offering, Reed and other executives spun Octerra out of its parent company as a separate organization. Octerra was adopted by seven of the Fortune 100 in its first year.
https://octerra.com/
Built | Director of Engineering | Acquisition Lead
Oversaw the turnaround of a struggling division, from hiring to strategy to technical architecture. Oversaw the technical due diligence, integration planning and implementation of two acquisitions.
https://getbuilt.com

Experience

R. Tomlinson Consulting
Head Consultant
Feb 2020 - Present
We are a professional software consultancy specializing in SaaS strategy, cloud migrations, process & culture, and security & compliance. Our approach is simple: we embed in your organization so that we can provide immediate value, and we leave you with systems and process changes that will set you up for long-term success. Our primary goal is to work ourselves out of a job, not to create dependency. Learn more about our offerings and download our free white papers at RTomlinsonConsulting.com
- R. Tomlinson Consulting provides expertise in strategy, management and technology consulting. See RTomlinsonConsulting.com for more information and free whitepapers.
Built Technologies
Director Of Engineering
Jan 2022 - Jun 2023
Built is the fastest-growing construction and real estate finance platform in the U.S. and the leading provider of construction and real estate finance technology. By providing a centralized platform for all stakeholders, Built enables increased efficiency, collaboration, transparency, and business agility—with decreased risk – allowing customers to improve the way that the communities around them are built and managed. The Built platform is used by more than 270 leading North American lenders and asset managers, and thousands of developers, home builders, and contractors. Our company is made up of passionate people who are driven in a variety of disciplines—and each of them brings a unique perspective to everything they do. Creating a safe and inclusive workplace is critical to the success of our company and of our employees, so it’s our aim to recruit, hire and promote without bias against race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, veteran status or any other status protected by applicable law. As we learn and as we grow, we’re committed to ensuring that these ideals are at the forefront of everything we do. To find out more visit getbuilt.com.
- Provided people and performance management, technical oversight, business operations management and business strategy for two divisions serving different customer segments. Responsible for hiring and performance management, financial and operational reporting, and strategic planning.
- Restructured two divisions to better serve distinct customer groups, driving alignment across functional areas and business units.
- Worked with Product leadership to define market entry strategy and KPIs for two new products.
- Developed internal tools and processes to reduce time-to-value and CAC payback duration.
- Managed two acquisitions (5-person and 25-person acqui-hires) from due diligence, through closing, to successful integration.
- Drove 50% reduction in total cost of ownership for legacy tech without compromising customer satisfaction (NPS) or annual recurring revenue.
- Developed a strategic and organizational approach to artificial intelligence developments, leveraging new tooling to accelerate time-to-market by more than 20%. Worked with Legal and Compliance to draft new organizational policies for the use of AI tools.
Trilogy
Product Chief Technology Officer | SVP of Technical Product Management
Oct 2020 - Oct 2021
Founded in 1989, Trilogy has enjoyed years of profitable success working exclusively with Global 1000 companies. Trilogy provides technology powered business services that result in transformational economic value for its customers. Unique in the industry, Trilogy ties its own revenue directly to the economic value it delivers. Trilogy business services are focused on the Automotive, Insurance and Telecom industries.
- Provides technical product management and architecture strategy for the ESW Capital portfolio of companies, as well as prospective acquisitions and external clients. Responsibilities include migrating legacy products to cloud native services in AWS, and designing new products and platforms. Part of a team of 20 who make technical product decisions for a team of over 2,000 developers.
- The majority of products ESW Capital evaluates are SaaS applications in the AWS cloud, but cover a wide range of industries and are built on a wide range of technologies.
- Personally evaluates one to two products per week, making recommendations on core tech decisions, and architecting improvements and rebuilds – and then see those recommendations through completion with our engineering team, with cycle times anywhere from two weeks to six months.
Octerra
Chief Technology Officer
Jan 2019 - Dec 2020
Octerra is the leading procurement SaaS platform for marketing production, giving brands and their agencies real time visibility into their entire production spend.
- Built the tech team from one employee to 15 while serving 5k+ monthly active users in 48 countries.
- Created a culture of empathetic leadership, continual learning, and mentorship as a primary team value.
- Surpassed availability, security, compliance, and data continuity requirements of our Fortune 100 clients.
- Maintained a 99.99% uptime.
- Remained VP of Technology at StudioNow; managed split of the two companies.
StudioNow
Vice President Of Technology
Jan 2016 - Dec 2020
Create any content, anywhere. StudioNow offers extensive creative production services, expanding your team’s capacity for projects of all sizes, including photography, video, editing, events, influencer campaigns, and more. Our platform and expert team streamline your production workflow, eliminating the inefficiencies tied to traditional third-party methods.
- What began as an eight-week DevOps contract turned into a four-year journey at StudioNow.
- Built tech team from one employee to 12; Launched a SaaS / Services platform to Fortune 100 clients.
- Implemented Agile processes and organization-wide DevOps practices.
- Stabilized legacy platform (from 25% error rate to <0.1%).
- Rearchitected two platforms. Went from failing basic security checks to passing Fortune 100 security audits.
- Successfully completed three large cloud migrations, moving in-production enterprise systems to AWS and rearchitecting for security, availability, and cost.
- Director of Engineering (Mar 2017 – Jan 2019)
- Senior Developer (Mar 2016 – Mar 2017)
Bellhops
Senior Developer, Project Manager
Jan 2015 - Dec 2016
Named a Best Moving Company in 2022 by U.S. News - Bellhop is one of the fastest-growing tech companies in the US, transforming the deeply broken $30B moving industry with an advanced tech-enabled model that delivers world-class customer experiences and prices that are untouchable by traditional movers. Serving over 65 cities nationwide. Featured in The New York Times, Forbes, USA Today, Inc. Magazine, Fast Company, Fox Business, Business Insider and many others.
- Led development of the Bellhop API and significant portions of the iOS and Android apps. Managed third-party integration projects and development of key microservices.