Colin McNamara

Austin, TX · selfimprovingcode.ai

Independent technology practice since 2002, now focused on building products and methodology for the AI-native age. Thesis: self-improving agents driving the software lifecycle. Operating at two levels: building production AI products AND building the tools and infrastructure that make building better.

• Acquit.ai — Full-stack litigation intelligence platform. Collect, verify, classify, brief, present, prove. Open-source evidence protocol (ExhibitCTL, MIT) with SaaS platform on top. Speaking at AI & Law Summit (March 2026)
• FrawdBot — Insider threat detection for Google Workspace. Behavioral pattern analysis, graph neural networks, and LLM-driven forensic investigation. Monitors agent and human behavior for anomalous actions, scope escalation, and data exfiltration
• Agentic AI consulting for regulated industries (FDA, NRC, FINRA) — multi-agent architectures (Claude Code, LangGraph, MCP), skills-based orchestration via Claude Agent SDK, LLM-as-judge governance, and production observability (LangSmith, LangFuse, OpenTelemetry)
• Full-stack security: prompt injection defense, air-gapped inference (Ollama), fine-tune distribution to local endpoints, and defense-in-depth agent monitoring. LangSmith Ambassador

Austin, TX

Co-founded clean-label food tech company as 49% owner. Grew from zero to $9M ARR in 3 years. Built proprietary AI software (Always Cool AI) to automate supply chain, compliance, and fraud detection across the operation. National retail distribution including Sprouts across 24 states, national organic retailers, and regional chains.

• Embedded in the full CPG concept-to-cash workflow: reverse-engineering top-selling products, replacing dyes and harmful additives with clean-label alternatives, optimizing supply chains, and writing applications for every inefficiency and risk encountered along the way
• Applied Lean Six Sigma methodology from OCI/Purdue to CPG operations — brought scientific rigor to recipe development and formulation through DMAIC cycles, AI-powered spectrum analysis for automated nutritional computation, and pipelines that took products from bench sample to commercialized production process. Built AI-driven systems for FDA compliance workflows including automated labeling, nutritional analysis, and retail submission pipelines
• Built a custom AI-powered ERP system (Always Cool AI) from the ground up after inheriting supply chain operations — distribution, payments, controller functions — where fraud was endemic and existing systems failed; integrated AI-driven fraud detection, purchase order processing, inventory management, and oversight across co-manufacturers, ingredient suppliers, brokers, and 3PL partners
• Led engineering and finance; participated in every product design call from concept through manufacturing — developed manufacturing partnerships, cold chain logistics, broker/distributor networks, and FDA compliance infrastructure

Austin, TX

Returned to Oracle — whose production infrastructure Colin had originally designed as an ePlus consultant — to build the CI/CD and software-driven operations vision the platform needed. Progressed from architect to service owner of 4 global services spanning 64 data center networks and 116,000 devices powering all Oracle SaaS, sovereign states, three-letter agencies, major banks, and the White House.

• Inherited the most degraded platforms (Gen1/Gen2) and turned them around using CAPA (Corrective Action Preventive Action) — an FDA methodology applied at service provider scale. Managed 38 audits/year (FedRAMP, SOC, PCI, US Gov); automated compliance processes that now inform FDA, NRC, and FINRA governance work
• Applied statistical process control (Purdue Engineering) at global scale: 58% reduction in outage minutes, 24% increase in Oracle SaaS availability. Reduced ops team from 70 to 12 via SRE model and open source monitoring
• Led global optical engineering across OCI Gen1/Gen2/Gen3 — designed Oracle's first transcontinental optical backbone; led global optical plant refresh with 4 manufactured integrated rack SKUs and a white box switching platform achieving 100Gbps
• Scaled infrastructure through Zoom's COVID surge and TikTok's explosive growth, operating multiple generations of hardware and software at global scale with a lean team
• Skip-level to Clay Magouyrk (current Oracle co-CEO); represented physical infrastructure in Oracle's cross-functional AI/ML operations leadership group

Austin, TX

Post-exit exploration after completing Dimension Data earn-out — pursued deep tech interests and figured out the next chapter.

• Deep tech R&D: cooperative robotics, additive manufacturing at scale, automated agriculture systems, and agricultural drone overflight with computer vision
• Pioneered corporate structures that became RENUP (renup.org) — reimagining nuptial contracts using LLC frameworks as a safer alternative to family court marriage contracts
• DevOps transformation consulting; Cisco Talent Bridge for Veterans — mentoring transitioning service members

• Built and led DevOps, Agile SDN, and Cloud development org for Dimension Data Americas; co-chaired DevOps transformation for 29,000 global employees
• Lectured at Carnegie Mellon — CMU based their cloud computing program on an open source platform Colin co-created with Yahoo
• Cisco CTO Council, EMC CTO Council, Intel Developer Forum; created first DevOps go-to-market for a global systems integrator

Pleasanton, CA — Acquired by Dimension Data

One of three directors at start, 22 at acquisition; inherited a LOB that had peaked at $30M/year on shell games — it returned more product than it sold the quarter Colin took over. Led 62-person org through reorganization, then restructured the full 330-person engineering org — growing Nexus IS from $130M to $660M revenue in 3 years through acquisition.

• Turned the fraudulent $30M LOB into $100M in 18 months ($12M profit), then to $180M/year by exit. Reinvested $1.4M of profit to bootstrap the in-house SDN dev org that made the company an acquisition target — SP customers adopted open source libraries, driving margins and the acquisition position
• Early DevOps Days champion and top global technology voice on social media — key to bringing DevOps methodology into Cisco Systems
• Designed OVS software for Cisco Nexus 9000 switch OS under Prem Jain (Ethernet switch inventor); first SDN app on Cisco's marketplace. Integrated with OpenStack, VMware private cloud, NSX (Nicira)
• Created NexusConnect — manufactured integrated systems for PCI financial processing and contact centers, scalable to 50+ racks. Established standards that influenced EMC VSpecs and VCE Vblock architecture
• Cisco Partner Technology Advisory Board (CTO Council) and EMC CTO Council

San Diego → Silicon Valley

Board-interviewed into a 7-person senior engineering team. Helped grow ePlus from $384M to $1B/year (NASDAQ bell-ringing). Turned around SoCal, then promoted to Practice Director for data center across the western US. First storage CCIE outside Cisco (later Data Center CCIE).

• Reverse-engineered Cisco UCS before product briefing — became top technical resource for Cisco data center platform development globally
• iCloud — Network Architect. Architected the world's largest CDN in 6 months; led software teams building bespoke deployment tooling; $113M hardware sale with recurring revenue
• NetApp — deployed largest UCS cluster on Earth (Kilo cluster)
• Oracle (as customer) — designed production DC architecture replicated to 60 core DCs globally; consolidated Sun Microsystems post-acquisition. This became the foundation Colin returned to build on as an Oracle employee
• Early OpenStack; UCS container compute powering first Mars Lander data viz; first DevOps toolchains out of ePlus; parallel compute (NVIDIA); Indian Gaming; healthcare (Cedars-Sinai); national accounts (Cox, Adobe)

Earlier Career (1997–2007)

Joined the Marine Corps at 17. Used software to automate manufacturing of digital video surveillance systems (Pelco). One of the first students in Cisco's Networking Academy globally. At 18, built DKA Online into one of Central California's largest ISPs — multiple POPs, web hosting, and physical network connections across California, climbing grain silos to shoot wireless links into rural communities. Moved to Silicon Valley to work alongside the Stanford researchers building the internet.

Knapp Publishing — Led bricks-to-clicks digital transformation of a 100-year-old print company; at 19, built web-scale platforms where portions of HP.com and Microsoft.com ran on his infrastructure · ID Analytics — Systems Engineering Operations under Dr. Steven Coggeshall; built scale-out data centers processing millions of daily financial transactions for fraud detection using high-dimensional mathematical analysis (acquired by LifeLock) · Openwave Systems — Senior Network Engineer (900 production + 2,000 dev servers); wrote Perl/Tcl automation at 19 — DevOps before DevOps existed · Extrateam — first DWDM optical ring around the Bay Area (AT&T); large-scale voice/PBX deployments for schools and enterprise · USMC — Crash Fire Rescue / InfoSec; rebuilt 3rd Marine Air Wing network within 72 hours after cyber attack — Navy Achievement Medal