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Architecture sprint or review — lock the problem, risks, and plan before a full build.
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About
Production backends that stay correct under load — Java, Spring Boot, distributed systems. Banking & FinTech as strongest proof. Dakar · remote worldwide.
- 4+ years in production
- Bank of Africa Group delivery via Synapse
- West Africa · Remote worldwide
- Bilingual FR / EN
Saïfoulaye Diallo
Hi — I’m Saïfoulaye. I build production backends that stay correct under load.
I’m a Senior Backend Engineer focused on backend engineering, distributed systems, APIs, and software architecture. I work mainly with Java and Spring Boot, but I care more about understanding the problem, making the right trade-offs, and building systems that remain reliable as they evolve.
My experience spans products, enterprise platforms, banking, FinTech, and payment integrations — turning complex requirements into simple, maintainable, production-ready backends.
Good software is the right decisions: simplicity over unnecessary complexity, reliability over short-term fixes, and business impact over technical vanity.
Strongest proof: banking and payment backends — mobile money corridors, ledger-safe money movement, and API governance for regulated teams. Open to products, platforms, and SaaS that need the same rigor.
Outside delivery, I ship side systems and write about architecture decisions drawn from real production constraints.
I enjoy working with people who think critically, care about quality, and want to build things that last — hire, project, or long-term collaboration.
FocusJavaSpring BootBackendDistributed SystemsAPIsCloudSoftware Architecture
Senior Backend Engineer
Dakar · West Africa · Remote Worldwide
4+
Production Years
11+
Banking subsidiaries
FR/EN
Bilingual delivery
Languages
French
Native / full professional
English
Professional working (written)
Ways I can help
Ship the system
Scoped build or MVP acceleration — named ownership from milestones through production handoff.
Embed capacity
Contract embed or platform modernization — senior depth inside your team or program.
Core capabilities
Where production systems are won — backend depth from APIs and distributed architectures to domain integrations when the problem demands it.
Enterprise Backend Engineering
Build backends designed to change without rewrites — clean architecture, decoupled modules, and business logic that stays auditable as the system and the team grow. The same approach applied across 11+ Bank of Africa subsidiary integrations.
Stack
JavaSpring BootSpring SecurityPostgreSQLApache Kafka
Patterns: Domain-Driven Design (DDD) · Bounded contexts · ACID and eventual consistency
API Architecture & Governance
Design APIs as a governed product surface: contract-first, versioned, and observable — built for partner integrations that need to evolve without breaking existing consumers.
Stack
OpenAPISpring Cloud GatewayJWTWebhooksHMAC
Patterns: Backward-compatible APIs · Contract-first design · Rate limiting
Distributed Systems Engineering
Build event-driven systems that stay correct under retries and partial failures — outbox, idempotent consumers, and circuit breaking on real payment and platform flows.
Stack
Apache KafkaDockerKubernetesAWS
Patterns: Transactional outbox · Idempotent consumers · Circuit breaking
Payment Platforms
Design payment rails that hold up under audit and scale: idempotent by default, reconciled automatically against provider statements, and routed across payment providers without locking the business into one of them.
Stack
Java (8/11/17/21)Spring BootPostgreSQLRedisApache Kafka
Patterns: Idempotency on every write · Reconciliation against provider statements · Cross-provider routing
Cloud & DevOps for Regulated Delivery
Ship production backends in containers — Docker and Kubernetes on the banking work, AWS and GitLab CI on the FinTech platform.
Stack
DockerKubernetesAWSGitLab CI/CD
Patterns: CI pipelines tied to delivery · Containerized services · High-availability ownership
Unified Mobile Money Integrations
One API over Orange Money, Wave, and Free Money — shared error handling, reconciliation, and a stable contract when another corridor is added.
Stack
JavaSpring BootRedisApache Kafka
Patterns: Provider adapters · Webhook normalization · Idempotency
Production stack
The stack behind the roles and case studies — Java and Spring in production. Banking and payments are the deepest proof.
Backend
Java (8–21)Spring BootSpring SecuritySpring CloudSpring BatchSpring Data
Data & messaging
PostgreSQLMySQLRedisApache Kafka
Delivery
DockerKubernetesAWSGitLab CI/CDOpenAPI
Domains
REST APIsWebhooksJWTIdempotencyReconciliationWaveOrange MoneyFree Money
Product UI
AngularTypeScriptReact
Engineering Principles
Good software is not about the most sophisticated technology — it is about the right decisions.
Simplicity
Prefer the simplest design that solves the real problem. Unnecessary complexity is a tax on every future change.
Reliability
Choose durable solutions over short-term fixes — idempotency, clear failure modes, and systems that remain correct as they evolve.
Business impact
Optimize for outcomes that matter to the business and its users — not for technical vanity or novelty for its own sake.
Security
Zero-trust at boundaries, least privilege, and auditability woven into flows — especially where money and regulated data move.
Maintainability
Precise boundaries, clear contracts, and codebases teams can change with confidence months and years later.
Clean Architecture
Business logic at the core. Infrastructure at the edge — so the platform adapts to change, not the other way around.
Hiring this profile — or starting a project?
Hiring: Experience on this page, then the CV. A project: an architecture sprint (1–2 weeks, €2.5k–€4.5k), then a written proposal.