Nikola Paunović’s digital CV
Senior backend engineer and team lead with a focus on data-heavy consumer applications.
About
Senior backend engineer and team lead focused on data‑heavy consumer applications.
Comfortable owning systems end‑to‑end in small, fast‑moving teams, currently leading the backend for Yuno, a general‑knowledge audio learning app with 10‑minute stories and quizzes.
Core focus: reliable APIs, efficient data access, and shipping consistently. Deepening backend expertise (databases, queues, observability) and learning Go Lang.
Experience 🧑🏻💻
Senior Software Developer Team Lead @Gaiali / Yuno (June 2021 - Present · Berlin, Germany)
Yuno is a general-knowledge audio learning app with 10‑minute stories and quizzes.
- Lead a backend team of 4 engineers building core features for Yuno.
- Drive backend architecture decisions, balancing simplicity with scalability as the product grows.
- Own and optimize a 400GB+ Postgres database: schema design, query tuning, and performance improvements for content and user data.
- Use Redis for caching and async job processing, handling notifications and content pipelines.
- Manage deployments and coordinate releases across backend, mobile, and frontend teams.
- Collaborate with product to scope and plan features, balancing business needs with technical feasibility.
- Maintain engineering quality through code reviews and team standards.
- Tech stack: Swift, Vapor, Postgres, Redis, TypeScript, React, Next.js, Python, AWS, Heroku.
Senior Software Developer @LegalOne GmbH (June 2017 - May 2021 · Berlin Metropolitan Area)
Built an in‑house, service‑oriented CRM (50+ microservices) to replace a legacy system for Germany’s traffic law market leader.
- Developed services in PHP/Symfony and Go using CQRS patterns for clean read/write separation and scalability.
- Built async workflows with RabbitMQ, event logs, and dead letter queues for reliable message processing.
- Used Elasticsearch as a caching layer to speed up read‑heavy operations.
- Developed and maintained shared libraries used across services.
- Deployed services using Kubernetes and Helm Charts for controlled rollouts.
- Contributed to engineering practices: code reviews, test coverage, and coding standards.
- Tech stack: PHP (Symfony), Go, Vue, Docker, AWS, Kubernetes, Elastic Stack, RabbitMQ, MySQL, MongoDB, PHPUnit, Cypress.
Previous experience
Senior software developer Key4Talent GmbH (Jan 2017 - May 2017)
Custom HR software that makes possible to match the personality profile of an applicant with a vacancy and come to an ideal personality to job match.
- BE client facing services and back-office API’s and integration with the external services.
- Tech stack: PHP(Symfony), Ruby, AWS, Postgres.
Senior software developer @HolyCode (Feb 2016 - Nov 2016)
As dedicated team for Knip AG, we developed custom CRM as backup for business model.
Focused on automation of operation processes to reduce manpower in operations field and reduce human errors.
- Clients facing Backend API’s, integration with external services, NLP and classifications.
- Tech stack: PHP(Symfony), React, AWS, Python(NLP, OCR), MySQL, Memcached, Docker, Kubernetes.
Software developer @Htec (Feb 2015 - Feb 2016)
Outsourcing for multiple clients, work involved mostly of custom tailored CRMs.
- Tech stack: PHP(Symfony), Docker, Kubernetes, MySQL, Mongo, Angular.
Languages 🇷🇸, 🇺🇸, 🇩🇪
- Serbian 🇷🇸: Native
- English 🇺🇸: Fluent
- German 🇩🇪: B1 (vielleicht B2)
Education 🎓
- VISER Belgrade, Serbia. Bachelor’s Degree, Computer Science (2006-2009)
About & hobbies 👨👩👦