Hi, my name is
Sivabalan Balasubramanian
I build systems that scale under pressure.
Senior Platform Engineer with 11+ years designing async platforms, rule engines, and high-throughput APIs across FinTech and Banking. Currently building AI-powered developer tools — on-device privacy gates and intelligent automation workflows.
Recent
Recent Work & Writing
articleseries · 2 parts
Engineering Beyond Prompts
In the previous article, I made a case that AI coding is becoming an engineering discipline. One principle kept surfacing while writing it: better models don't replace better thinking. The natural nex
aicost-engineeringproductivity
note
AI Coding Cost: What 8 Days of Data Actually Showed
Context I started tracking my OpenCode usage carefully over an eight-day period while writing the cost engineering article. I expected the API bill to tell me something interesting. It did — just not
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Model Evaluation Experiment: Does the Expensive Model Win?
Context While writing the cost engineering article, I wanted to test whether the intuitions I'd formed from real usage held up under structured evaluation. The thesis: model cost and model performance
aicost-engineeringopencode
articleseries · 8 parts
Learning AI Engineering by Building
In the previous article in this series, I wrote about pragmatic AI engineering and how reviewing model-generated code is the new bottleneck. We focused on tiered intelligence and token mirrors to mana
ai-engineeringarchitecturesystem-design
articleseries · 1 parts
How I Think About System Design
The Systems That Held Up Every system I've built that survived production had one thing in common: the architecture wasn't clever. The decisions were clear, the constraints were respected, and when th
system-designarchitecture
perspective
When Work Becomes Life
Monday standups at my jobs abroad often started with weekend stories. One colleague was raising chickens and had strong opinions about coop design. Another was rebuilding a car engine in his garage, p
culturecareerwork-life
Experience
Where I've Worked
Senior Software Engineer
Jul 2024 — PresentACV Auctions
Chennai, IndiaDesigned a modular Rule Engine Platform for credit decisioning, reducing manual review by ~30%. Built a high-throughput FastAPI Performance API with async pipelines achieving ~50% lower latency. Improved observability with structured logging and Datadog APM dashboards.
FastAPIPythonKubernetesPostgreSQLDatadog
Case Study: Rule EngineLead Engineer
Feb 2022 — Jul 2024Lloyds Banking Group
London, UKEngineered low-latency aiohttp async APIs processing millions of regulatory events. Designed Kubernetes workloads with HPA, mTLS, and Spinnaker deployments. Led FaaS pod architecture reducing resource footprint. Reduced pod memory by ~20% through streaming patterns.
aiohttpKubernetesSpinnakerSplunkReact
View projectFull Stack Developer
Sep 2019 — Jan 2022Tiger Analytics
Chennai, IndiaLed end-to-end delivery across backend, frontend, and analytics layers. Built Flask applications with D3.js visualizations for PE firms and BFS/CPG clients. Optimized SQL schemas and ingestion pipelines for high-volume datasets.
FlaskD3.jsReactAngularAzurePower BI
Python Developer
Apr 2018 — Jul 2019KONE
Chennai, IndiaBuilt high-performance Tornado web applications for real-time operational reporting. Improved CI/CD workflows with Jenkins and Docker. Developed Wireshark dissectors in Lua for network protocol analysis.
PythonTornadoDockerJenkinsLua
Python Developer
May 2017 — Dec 2017K7 Computing
Chennai, IndiaBuilt automated scraping pipelines using Requests, BeautifulSoup, and Selenium. Developed ETL workflows and ingestion tools for high-frequency MySQL database updates.
PythonSeleniumBeautifulSoupMySQLETL
Oracle DBA
Jan 2014 — Dec 2015Tata Consultancy Services
Chennai, IndiaPerformed Oracle performance tuning, indexing, and materialized view optimizations. Automated backup and import workflows with Bash scripts across multiple environments.
OracleSQLBashPerformance Tuning
About
A Bit About Me
I got my start as an Oracle DBA and spent years learning how data actually moves — slowly, expensively, and usually at the worst possible time. That shaped how I think about backend systems: reliability and observability aren't features, they're the foundation.
Over 11 years I've worked through Chennai, London, and across global remote teams — from regulated banking infrastructure at Lloyds to credit decisioning systems at ACV Auctions. The problems that interest me most sit at the intersection of correctness and speed: how do you process a million financial events without dropping any, and still ship on Friday?
Lately I've been drawn to AI tooling — not the hype, but the practical side. On-device models that keep data private. Commit generators that match your team's style. Tools that actually reduce the friction of building software.
MS in Computer Science from California State University, Sacramento. Based in Chennai.
Technologies I work with:
▸Python (asyncio, FastAPI)▸Distributed Systems▸Kubernetes / Docker▸PostgreSQL / Oracle▸System Design▸aiohttp / Tornado▸React / TypeScript▸AWS / GCP / Azure▸CI/CD Pipelines▸Datadog / Splunk▸Rule Engines▸ETL Pipelines
Let's talk.
Have a problem worth solving or something interesting to share? I'd love to hear from you.