Brett Heliker

Portland, OR 97201 · bheliker@gmail.com

Career Summary

I am an Systems Architect specializing in full-stack IoT and sensor systems. My experience ranges from Unicorns to Defense, from routing PCBs to architecting high-throughput, low-latency cloud computing systems. My hardware designs and software implementations have been in space, military training, consumer hands, and manufactured in large-scale, six figure production runs. I've lead small, focused teams and larger cross-disciplinary teams. I have architected Big Data platforms, pioneered R&D efforts, authored whitepapers and evangelized products to clients and investors. My experience is broad – and I'm always looking for something new to learn.

Experience

Solutions Architect

  • Design and presentation of technical solutions and demonstrations, including building a library of re-usable content, templates, Notebooks, recorded presentations and public documentation. For examples:
  • Systems integration and implementation on customers’ technical stacks including POC and POM systems, readiness assessments, early customer deployments and continuing support as technical advisor and liason.
  • Developer advocacy, outreach and evangelism for our product, SDKs and opensource efforts through tech talks, blog posts, events, meetups, and community outreach.
  • November 2020 - July 2022

    Founder

    Gear warranty and longevity tracking tool. This has been an amazing lesson in building a consumer product and company from idea through implementation and sustainment. From pitching, securing investment, recruiting technology talent, and partnering with industry titans.
    2019 - Current

    Staff Solutions Architect, Internet of Things Architect

  • Recruited and lead a team to to develop, design, produce and maintain novel IoT hardware and cloud architecture, data ingestion, and device management for over 20 clients.
  • Managed R&D and special projects teams to rapidly ingest, transform and visualize data, to build POC and POM systems directly resulting in 6+ multi-million dollar deals in Energy, Fleet and Defense verticals and the opening of 2 new lines of revenue.
  • Founded the Sales & Solutions Engineering group to interface between clients and Uptake's sales force on all technical matters including live demonstrations, technical presentations, readiness assessments, POC/POMs, and proposals. After 1 year, a deal was 60% more likely to be signed when a Sales Engineer was part of the process.
  • Authored technology roadmaps, IoT strategies, data migration, disaster recovery and data backup strategies and cloud performance tuning for many clients, reducing recurring costs by 6 figures and ensuring long term relationships.
  • Accolades:"Best-In-Class" award (6/17), "Uptake Ambassador" (6/2016), "Conscious Leader" (8/2017).

    February 2015 - October 2019

    Director of Technology Insertion, Hardware ; TS clearance

  • Directed the FlexTrain Hardware R&D team to develop sensors and systems for a realtime asset tracking platform. Reduced production and fielding cost by 80% while improving reliability and throughput by an order of magnitude, increasing profitability enough to spin the technology into a spinoff.
  • Accelerated use of geospatial technologies, virtual terrain generation and neogeography to dramatically reduce data gathering costs from 6 months and $1.8m to less than 4 weeks and under $100k per project, and revolutionize geospatial data display for the JTEP program.
  • Guided use of human-machine interaction in real-world training applications to productize a nacent technology in BRIGHT23
  • 2004 - 2014

    “Chief Belay Officer”

    Using a variety of techniques to exert tension on, support, coach and protect Chalkd as it develops. Responsibilities ranging from sales and design to implementation and architecture, to being the number 1 customer.
    2019 - Current

    Architect and CTO

    Architecture, design and implementation of everything engineering – from hardware design, development and production to IoT infrastructure to building the website.
    2016-2018

    Engineering Consultation

    Matterport
    Hypothesis-driven consulting on prototype hardware design, manufacturability and ruggedization.
    Adjacent Applications
    Directed software engineering teams for native mobile and web application development, collaborated on technology strategy, and recruited technology talent. Additional help in social media strategy.
    2011 – 2014

    Education

    California Polytechnic State University

    M.S. in Aerospace Engineering
    Thesis topic includes Kalman filtering and control theory

    Focus in Systems Engineering

    2003 - 2004

    California Polytechnic State University

    B.S. in Aerospace Engineering
    Spacecraft concentration with emphasis on control theory and communications
    1999 - 2003

    Pleasant Valley High School

    AP/IB Honors distinction

    GPA: 4.3

    1996-1999

    Patents, papers & presentations