--- address: - | **Professional**\ LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/bastiangruber\ Book: rustwebdevelopment.com\ E-Mail: gruberbastian@me.com\ Website: bastiangruber.ca - | **Code**\ GitHub: github.com/gruberb\ Git: code.novanexus.ca/gruberb --- # Bastian Gruber ## Summary Staff Engineer at Mozilla, shipping Rust, C++, and Python to hundreds of millions of Firefox users across Desktop, Android, and iOS. Promoted for leading cross-team projects and getting complex, multi-platform features shipped. 12+ years of backend and systems work across distributed services, Kubernetes-based infrastructure, and production operations; published Rust author and long-time technical writer. ## Skills **Languages:** Rust, C++, Python, TypeScript, Go **Systems & Backend:** async Rust (Axum, Actix), Python/FastAPI, Node.js, FFI/UniFFI, gRPC, REST **Architecture:** distributed systems, P2P protocols, system design, cross-platform (Desktop/Android/iOS) **Infrastructure & Observability:** AWS, GCP, Docker, Kubernetes, CI/CD, Grafana, performance profiling ## Professional Experience ### Staff Software Engineer, Mozilla Feb 2026 - Present, Remote Promoted for cross-team technical leadership and delivering multi-platform privacy features. - Leading the Image Service project: replaced 3 fragile, duplicated favicon systems with a single GCS-backed API serving 4+ internal teams. Extended an existing Python/Airflow pipeline instead of building a new service, reducing maintenance burden across the board - Implemented Oblivious HTTP (OHTTP) in application-services (shared Rust component cross-compiled to Swift/Kotlin via UniFFI) and wrote the C++ integration for Firefox Desktop. Now live on Firefox iOS, Android, and Desktop, covering millions of users - Maintaining the Firefox Push notification service (Rust backend on Kubernetes, 50k req/s, sub-200ms latency). Reduced memory footprint, added circuit breakers, built Grafana dashboards for observability ### Senior Software Engineer, Mozilla Jun 2024 - Jan 2026, Remote - Core maintainer of Merino, the Kubernetes-deployed Python/FastAPI service powering Firefox Suggest. All search suggestions in Firefox route through Merino, which enriches and serves them in a privacy-preserving way - Code reviewer for UniFFI, Mozilla's multi-language bindings generator (Rust to Kotlin, Swift, Python, JavaScript) - Contributing directly to Firefox Desktop (mozilla-central): shipping Rust and C++ code - Led "Rusty Fridays" sessions (6-10 engineers per session), building internal Rust knowledge across teams ### Technical Editor, "From C to Rust", Manning Publications Feb 2026 - Present, Contract, Part-time Reviewing technical accuracy and pedagogical quality for Manning's C-to-Rust migration guide. ### Senior Systems Engineer, Team Lead, Toposware Apr 2023 - Jun 2024, Remote Core team of 4 building a peer-to-peer distributed network protocol from scratch in Rust, with Kubernetes-based deployment and benchmarking environments. Our core implementation of the double echo protocol and the Ethereum bridge became part of the Polygon stack after acquisition. - Achieved 10x message throughput per node by profiling the actual bottleneck: optimized batch processing and serialization paths after discovering nodes were compute-bound on crypto operations, not network-limited - Built the EVM bridge connecting external Ethereum-compatible chains to the core network - Led the internal benchmarking initiative that changed where the team focused optimization effort ### Senior Software Engineer, Centrifuge Aug 2022 - Feb 2023, Remote Protocol team building DeFi infrastructure on Substrate/Polkadot in Rust. - Implemented on-chain fund pool mutations, the core feature enabling live capital allocation adjustments in the lending protocol - Replaced manual documentation with CI-driven auto-generation from Rust source, eliminating persistent drift between code and public docs ### Author, "Rust Web Development", Manning Publications Oct 2020 - Dec 2022 Wrote and published an end-to-end guide covering async Rust, web frameworks, and production deployment. ### Sr. Solutions Architect, Twilio Inc. Jun 2020 - Jul 2022, Remote - Technical lead for Fortune 500 professional services engagements: diagnosed latency issues, redesigned messaging architectures, delivered implementation roadmaps sized to each client's team and resources - Created reusable engagement playbooks adopted across the EMEA Professional Services team ### Systems Engineer, Core Backend, Kraken Digital Asset Exchange Aug 2019 - May 2020, Remote Part of the first Rust team rewriting Kraken's core infrastructure from PHP. - Rewrote core banking services and API gateway in Rust, replacing legacy PHP services. The new stack handled significantly higher throughput with a smaller hardware footprint - Shipped the first version of the automated KYC verification flow, replacing manual processing right as COVID drove a massive spike in new customer sign-ups ### Earlier Career 2013 - 2019 Sr. Software Engineer (freelance from 2016) across enterprise clients (OSRAM, Koerber Digital, GIATA, Avenga) and startups (Dalia Research, blogfoster, smartB) in Berlin. - Founded "Rust & Tell Berlin" meetup, grew it into the largest Rust meetup globally. Coordinated with companies for venue sponsorship, organized speakers, photographers, and videographers. Gave talks and created a welcoming space for the Rust community - Designed IoT authentication infrastructure at OSRAM for thousands of connected devices (Node.js, Go, Lua) - First engineering hire at Koerber Digital: built real-time sensor data pipelines and cloud service deployments on AWS (Lambda, ECS, Route53, Kubernetes) - Decomposed GIATA's monolithic PHP system into 6 Docker-based services, taught the existing team Scrum and JavaScript - Contributed to the Rust compiler and standard library during a self-directed sabbatical (2019) ### Technical Writer, Freelance 2008 - 2020, Contract 13 years writing for technical publications including c't, iX, Macwelt (IDG/Heise), and tech blogs (LogRocket, stadt-bremerhaven.de, mobilegeeks.de). Also authored "OS X fuer Einsteiger" (Bookboon, 2012). ## Education ### Bachelor of Science, Computer Science Mar 2014, TH Ingolstadt Scholarship from Allianz Deutschland AG (fully funded dual-study program, 2010-2014).