Christoph Beckmann · Berlin
I help founders and CTOs build engineering organisations that scale.
Technology leadership since 2006. Founder of TechMiners, 40+ technology due diligences, former CTO of a 40+ person engineering organisation.
Where I led and built
About
Developer, team lead, CTO, founder. I have sat on both sides of the table.
I started as a software developer in 2006 and have spent the years since where technology and organisation meet. I have been the hands-on engineer, the team lead who grew a team from 4 to 40+ people, the CTO who moved a whole platform to the cloud, and the founder who built and ran a company with 15+ people.
That range is what I bring to the table. When a CTO asks how to structure their teams, or a founder asks whether the tech is ready for the next round, I have usually seen the situation from both sides, and I can tell what works in practice.
In 2019 I founded TechMiners, a Berlin-based provider of CTO-led technology due diligence, and led it until 2026. The company continues to operate and I remain a shareholder. During my time we completed more than 600 due diligences for private equity, venture capital and M&A transactions. Looking at that many technology organisations from the inside taught me what separates teams that scale from teams that stall.
Today I work as an independent advisor and sparring partner for founders and technology leaders. My approach is calm, direct and grounded in numbers. I tell you what I see, explain why, and help you decide what to do next.
Advisory
How I can help
01 · Leadership
CTO sparring and leadership coaching
A confidential counterpart for CTOs on roadmap, team structure, delegation and their own growth as a leader.
02 · Transition
Interim CTO and CTO transitions
Stepping in when technical leadership is in flux: handling the handover, running the search, and onboarding the successor.
03 · Organisation
Engineering organisation and DevOps culture
Turning mixed teams into autonomous, cross-functional units that build, test and run their own software.
04 · Strategy
Technology and cloud strategy
Architecture direction, cloud migration, and mobile or product strategy, including choosing the right engineering partner for your budget.
Selected work
What this looks like in practice
Cloud migration of a B2B SaaS video platform
0 downtime · 10× lower costs
Situation
The platform ran on-premise as a Java Spring application.
What I did
As CTO, I led three engineering teams through the move to Microsoft Azure within three months, re-architected the software to be cloud-native and built an automated CI/CD pipeline with elastic scaling for video transcoding.
Result
Zero downtime, 20 TB of data migrated, server costs reduced by a factor of 10.
Engineering transformation at a B2B SaaS video platform
3× faster releases
Situation
Mixed teams worked in an uncertain environment.
What I did
I introduced "you code it, you test it, you run it", built a DevOps culture from the ground up and grew a purely German team into an international engineering organisation.
Result
Autonomous, cross-functional teams and release cycles three times faster.
CTO transition and executive search, B2B SaaS
20+ candidates · no gap
Situation
The CTO was leaving and engineering continuity was at risk.
What I did
As interim CTO and advisor I managed the technical offboarding, streamlined the hiring process and interviewed 20+ executive candidates.
Result
The successor was onboarded with no interruption to engineering delivery.
CTO sparring and leadership coaching, B2B SaaS
Clear roles for scaling
Situation
A B2B SaaS platform needed roadmap alignment, structure and leadership growth at the top.
What I did
Over three months I reviewed the technology roadmap with the CTO and coached the leadership team on delegation and team autonomy.
Result
Clear departmental roles and an organisation structure that supports scaling.
Mobile app strategy for a D2C weight loss brand
Thousands → tens of thousands of installs
Situation
The brand needed a mobile app strategy and a development partner within a €500k budget.
What I did
In three months of part-time advisory I defined the product strategy and ran the agency selection.
Result
The right partner inside budget, and an MVP scaled from a few thousand to tens of thousands of installs with a sustainable revenue stream.
DevOps culture for a B2B SaaS content platform
Zero-downtime deployments
Situation
The team had no dedicated infrastructure engineer.
What I did
I introduced a Jenkins-based CI/CD pipeline and Infrastructure as Code with Puppet on AWS, and documented infrastructure and processes.
Result
Fully automated deployments with zero downtime, and a team trained to run the platform on its own.
International rollout of a B2C retail advertising platform
5 countries · 3M visitors/month
Situation
A German-only platform had to open up to international markets.
What I did
As team lead I made the platform i18n-ready, including time zones, added mobile support and automated CI/CD deployments.
Result
Launch in five countries under distinct brands, stable at 3 million unique visitors per month.
Career
Career in short
2024 – present
Organizer and Moderator
CTO Roundtable Berlin Meetup
2024 – present
Organizer and Moderator
CTO Roundtable Berlin Meetup
- Organise a quarterly meetup for CTOs and technology leaders.
- Bring together 30–50 attendees at each event.
- Moderate panel discussions and audience Q&A on current technology leadership topics.
2024 – present
Member
Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO), Berlin
2024 – present
Member
Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO), Berlin
- EO is a global network of entrepreneurs that helps business owners grow through peer learning, shared experiences, and leadership development.
- EO Berlin is the local chapter, connecting entrepreneurs to exchange ideas, learn from each other, and build meaningful business relationships.
2019 – 2026
Founder and Managing Director
TechMiners, Berlin
2019 – 2026
Founder and Managing Director
TechMiners, Berlin
- 600+ technology due diligences for PE, VC and M&A.
- Built a proprietary data platform and a standardised playbook for data-driven tech DD.
- The company continues to operate; I remain a shareholder.
2016 – 2018
CTO
MovingImage, Berlin
2016 – 2018
CTO
MovingImage, Berlin
- Led a 40+ person engineering and operations organisation (€3M+ budget).
- Moved the platform from on-premise to Microsoft Azure.
- Self-organising DevOps teams, 3× faster release cycles.
2015 – 2016
Founder, CTO/COO
Calobro, Berlin
2015 – 2016
Founder, CTO/COO
Calobro, Berlin
- Community-driven nutrition platform for personalised diet plans.
- Marketing funnel that grew the user base to 10,000+.
2014 – 2015
Senior Software Engineer
Taulia, Berlin / San Francisco
2014 – 2015
Senior Software Engineer
Taulia, Berlin / San Francisco
- Coached distributed teams in San Francisco, Park City, Austin and Sofia in DevOps practices.
- Jenkins-based CI/CD for 8 development teams across 4 time zones.
2013 – 2015
Technical Advisor
RapidApe, Berlin
2013 – 2015
Technical Advisor
RapidApe, Berlin
- Sparring partner to the CTO on technical strategy.
- Exit in May 2015 on acquisition by ProSiebenSat.1.
2010 – 2014
Developer, then Team Lead
kaufDA (Bonial), Berlin
2010 – 2014
Developer, then Team Lead
kaufDA (Bonial), Berlin
- Scaled the organisation from 4 to 40+ people together with the CTO.
- Internationalisation for Brazil, Russia, the US and France.
- Six months in Chicago to set up the first US office and hire the initial IT team.
2009 – 2010
Junior Consultant
maxence it, Cologne
2009 – 2010
Junior Consultant
maxence it, Cologne
- Enterprise web applications for clients including Deutsche Bank, IBM, Vodafone and the German Armed Forces.
Let's talk it through
Facing a leadership, architecture or transition question? Get in touch for a first conversation. I also organise the CTO Roundtable Berlin Meetup and am a member of EO Berlin.
christoph.beckmann@colibri-media.de