Darshan Gada
dr5hn — AI Engineer · Technical Innovation Leader · Open Source Contributor. Mumbai, India. 10+ years in production.
Full-stack engineer turned AI builder. I ship AI agents, design system architecture, and developer tooling — and I maintain open-source geo-data that 50k+ developers run in production.
About
I've spent 10+ years as a full-stack engineer, and these days I specialise in AI-powered product development, technical leadership, and developer tooling. I build AI agents, architect design systems, and lead teams that ship production-grade web apps. I also maintain the Country-State-City database — an open geo-data platform that's served billions of API requests. I like turning emerging AI capability into practical tools that make teams faster.
Experience
Head of AI & Innovations — SOZO Design
2025 — Present. Promoted from Senior Full Stack Developer. Award-winning UK digital agency (Cheltenham · London).
- Built an internal AI briefing agent — PDF analysis, web research (Tavily), SSE streaming, multi-format export. Next.js 16, React 19, OpenAI Assistants API, Supabase.
- Built a RAG-based AI chatbot WordPress plugin with an n8n ingestion pipeline (Google Drive sync → PDF extraction → embeddings → Supabase vector storage).
- Designed an AI tool standardisation framework: approval process, privacy guidelines, evaluation periods, team adoption.
- Measured productivity gains: 15–40% on block development, 60–80% on documentation through AI adoption.
- Integrated Figma MCP with Claude Code for automated design-to-code workflows.
- Nominated for Employee of the Year.
Senior Full Stack Developer — SOZO Design
2021 — 2024. Led technical architecture across 10+ client projects.
- Architected WoodScanner v2: a white-label marketplace with dynamic styling (CSS variables + ACF + shell scripts).
- Adopted the Radicle WordPress framework across the team; standardised on Tailwind CSS.
- Led migration from Bitbucket to GitHub; established GitHub Actions across 50+ plugins.
- Built Teamwork CLI — an npm package replacing scattered scripts for project & desk management.
Technical Lead — Vistaar Digital Communications
2020 — 2021. Led a team of 5 (backend, frontend, mobile).
- Full ownership of architecture, code reviews, and deployments.
- Saved 15% of team effort through GitHub Actions automation.
- Cut debugging time by 50% via structured training.
Senior Software Engineer — Vistaar Digital Communications
2018 — 2020. Built products across many stacks for US clients & Indian pharma.
- Laravel, Node.js, React, Angular, Flutter, Django.
- Key builds: WeOne (Neo4j graph earnings algorithm), Slingshot (test-prep PWA), Enablr (pharma eDetailing).
- DevOps on Linode & AWS; Dockerised dev environments.
Web Developer — Adevole
2017 — 2018. Digital agency serving entrepreneurs.
- PHP, Laravel, WordPress, CodeIgniter builds.
- API integrations: Google Adwords/Adsense, Leadsquared, Moodle, Cashfree, Facebook, IATA.
Freelance Web Developer — Self-employed
2015 — 2017. Where it started.
- Static and WordPress sites for clients across India.
Open Source — Country · State · City
An open-source geo-data ecosystem I maintain: a core dataset in 11+ formats, a freemium API, an export tool, a community manager, an encyclopedia, npm + Python packages, and automated changelogs. 250 countries, 5,308 states, 153,768 cities. 9k+ GitHub stars · 3k+ forks · 127+ contributors · 50k+ developers · 5B+ API requests served.
Links:
countrystatecity.in,
GitHub repository.
Selected Projects
- CSC Database — the open dataset behind everything: 250 countries, 5,299 states, 153,768 cities in 11+ formats, auto-generated via GitHub Actions. (PHP, Python, MySQL.)
- CSC API — freemium REST API with dashboard, API keys, and usage management. (Express, Prisma, Redis, Bull, GitHub OAuth, Zod.)
- CSC Export Tool — build tailored datasets in the browser; 8 output formats, credit-based pricing. (React 19, Express, MongoDB, Redis, JSZip.)
- CSC Manager — community web UI to browse the data and submit corrections through a review process. (React, Node.js.)
- CSC CLI — search, explore, and generate code from geographic data in the terminal. (TypeScript, Node.js.)
- CSC Encyclopedia — a geographic encyclopedia with country profiles. (Next.js 16, React 19, Tailwind.)
- CSC Docs — complete API documentation and integration guides. (Mintlify, MDX.)
- CSC npm packages — zero-dependency, fully typed, offline-first, tree-shakeable. 427 timezones, 100% IANA coverage. (TypeScript, tsup, Vitest.)
- CSC Python package — fully typed Pydantic models, offline-first. (Pydantic, pytest, mypy, ruff.)
- iLoveJSON — 28+ JSON tools in one place: 20 bidirectional converters plus beautify, diff, merge, query, and faker. (Next.js, Prisma, NextAuth, Radix UI, Tailwind.)
- ccm (Claude Code Manager) — power-user toolkit for Claude Code: multi-account switching with OS keychain integration (macOS, Linux, WSL). (Shell, Bash.)
Skills
- AI / ML: AI Agents, RAG Architecture, Prompt Engineering, Multi-Agent Orchestration, Vector Search, Embeddings, AI Evaluation, MCP.
- AI Tooling: Claude Code, Cursor, n8n, OpenAI Assistants, Supabase Vectors, Tavily, GitHub Copilot, Pinecone.
- Backend: PHP 8, Laravel, Node.js, Python, Express, FastAPI, Django.
- Frontend: TypeScript, React, Next.js, Alpine.js, Three.js / R3F, Motion, Radix UI, Tailwind.
- Databases: MySQL, MongoDB, Redis, PostgreSQL, Neo4j, Elasticsearch, pgvector.
- DevOps: GitHub Actions, Docker, AWS, Vercel, Kinsta, Linode, Playwright, Cypress.
Education
- Master of Computer Application — IGNOU University, Delhi (2014 — 2017).
- B.Sc. Information Technology — Mumbai University (2008 — 2011).
Contact
Open to interesting AI + product work — full-time, and especially fractional engagements: Fractional AI / Engineering Lead, Fractional Architect, Fractional Code Reviewer, and AI adoption & advisory.