
Umer Arshad
Verified Expert in Engineering
Software Developer
Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan
Toptal member since October 5, 2021
Umer excels in C++ development across hardware and application levels. He has led automotive system development, created a patented data processing system, and built critical financial applications. Umer manages complex projects, solves problems swiftly, and adheres to modern software standards. He can lead teams to deliver efficiently, ensuring application stability and scalability. He is an active learner and a problem solver who can manage complex problems and tackle strict deadlines.
Portfolio
Experience
- Jira - 5 years
- C - 5 years
- C++11 - 5 years
- Arduino - 5 years
- C++ - 5 years
- Git - 4 years
- Visual Studio Code (VS Code) - 4 years
- Socket Programming - 4 years
Preferred Environment
Visual Studio Code (VS Code), C, Python, Amazon Web Services (AWS), ESP32, C++, Fintech, Embedded Systems, Internet of Things (IoT)
The most amazing...
...thing I've developed is a high-availability system with multiple nodes responsible for managing a telephony operations service, along with a monitoring system.
Work Experience
Technical Lead
Logiciel Services
- Redesigned and scaled the C++ Signal Engine by lowering end-to-end latency, adding intraday processing, building persistent candle storage with historical database retrieval, and enabling real-time WebSocket broadcasting for downstream trading systems.
- Enhanced the market data stack by extending FeedServer to support overnight and ATS symbols for true 24-hour coverage, improving ingestion and distribution pipelines, and deploying a latency-tracking framework across all feed components.
- Optimized market data feed server performance under high load, reducing latency for downstream clients, improving throughput and stability, and ensuring reliable delivery of real-time L1/L2, options, and derivatives data during peak market activity.
- Re-engineered repository structure and built workflows, unified submodules, improved CI/CD pipelines, and led incident response for outages and latency spikes, strengthening overall stability, maintainability, and operational efficiency.
- Managed a 5-engineer team, driving engineering standards, mentoring developers in modern C++ and low-latency architecture, overseeing Agile processes, and ensuring reliable 24/7 production operations for mission-critical data services.
Senior Software Engineer
Logiciel Services
- Redesigned the Position Service into a real-time microservices system, integrating FIX ingestion, SOD reconciliation, and optimized Redis workflows—boosting calculation performance by 35%.
- Led the end-to-end migration of the OMS from Windows to Linux and resolved critical issues in legacy modules, including FCM race conditions and billing discrepancies, improving platform stability.
- Improved system efficiency and deployment workflows by profiling Redis libraries for low-latency access, benchmarking core engine operations, and containerizing services to reduce deployment time by 50%.
- Resolved critical billing discrepancies in the Fee & Commission Module by fixing race conditions and enhancing audit logging.
- Benchmarked and tuned string-processing routines in the core engine, reducing CPU overhead in high-frequency workflows.
AWS IoT Full-stack Developer
WattsLights
- Led a WLED-based LED controller design and used ESP32 for Neopixel and SPI. Added BLE for app and global MQTT support. Enhanced web UI; auto-update system. Made multiple interfaces and supported multiple time zones. Automated builds; unit tests.
- Tracked and fixed tasks, features, and bugs via GitHub.
- Streamlined version control, streamlined release procedures, and introduced an efficient feature/bug monitoring system.
Service Lead | Lead Software Engineer
Afiniti
- Added TLS support in the communication channels for the high-availability solution. Updated the architecture to a multithreaded design to support multiple TCP client nodes. Added telemetry exporter to display stats over Prometheus and Grafana.
- Traced and fixed bugs using Jira as a reporting tool.
- Contributed to a patent as an author. The patent is filed for the work done for the high-availability solution.
- Added unit-testing scheme for the REST API-based service.
- Integrated Telemetry service along with REST API and other microservices.
Software Engineer
Pentaloop
- Developed a C++ and libcurl-based REST client to interact with OneDrive using MS Graph API. Implemented an authentication workflow using OAuth2.0. Worked with MSAL (Microsoft Authentication Layer) with interactive and silent authentication.
- Used Jira, Confluence, and Bitbucket for project management.
- Worked along with a resource while working on this project.
Firmware Developer for ESP32-based Systems
INDG Digitale Communicatie B.V.
- Implemented captive portal for AP mode. Added Firmware over the Air (FOTA) support. Created a flask server to send commands, downloaded and displayed pictures from an external server on screen, and added support for deep sleep mode.
- Displayed low battery levels on screen and tracked tasks milestones and issues using GitHub issues.
- Worked directly with the client providing milestone-based updates, and conducted weekly meetings to discuss progress.
Rasberry Pi Developer
Wash - Engineering
- Developed a Flask-based web server for Raspberry Pi to interact and collect data from environment sensors (temperature, humidity, noise, water level, and vibration). Developed a zero-crossing detector circuit to control the relays.
- Used Jira, Confluence, and Bitbucket for project management.
- Helped the client in multiple sessions to replicate the results on their side.
Senior Software Engineer
Afiniti
- Owned a Telemetry service that offers multiple telemetric operations using the Pistache framework for C++ and REST APIs. Developed new features and fixed bugs in the high-availability part of the company's product.
- Tracked and traced the development of the product using Jira, the established mechanism.
- Led a team of engineers and supported different teams in designing and fixing bugs of individual services in a microservices-based architecture.
Software Engineer
Afiniti
- Developed a high availability system that manages multiple nodes in different configurations, which involves a very fast switching rate and requires individual services monitoring.
- Worked on the Telephony feature server dealing with SIP 2.0-based message sending and handling.
- Designed and fixed bugs of individual services in a microservices-based architecture for the high-availability system.
- Played a key role as a project manager tracking bugs and features using Jira as a reporting tool.
Senior Software Development Engineer
Siemens Digital Industries Software
- Developed an in-house inter-vehicle system (IVS) embedded software and bootloaders for different microcontrollers and architectures based on ISO specifications for automotive software and multiplexed communication network protocols (CAN and LIN).
- Engaged directly with clients for debugging sessions and support.
- Played a key role as a project manager tracking bugs and features using Jira as a reporting tool.
Embedded Systems Developer
Siemens Digital Industries Software
- Developed program applications for different embedded hardware platforms and simulators.
- Worked on Kernel porting for Nucleus RTOS as part of my role.
- Developed UART and SPI device drivers for different hardware platforms.
- Tracked and fixed bugs using Jira as a reporting tool.
Experience
High Availability System
As the C++ developer for this project, I built the core service. I used the POSIX library to create TCP/UDP and multicast-based server/client. I additionally included a ping-pong mechanism to monitor the status of the nodes in the cluster continuously.
Besides that, I developed a monitoring system that continuously tracked the state of all the services involved in the holistic architecture and triggered specified actions based on various independent services issues.
Home Automation System
The system's brain contains a Raspberry Pi that stores the data and acts as a gateway routing commands from the Android application to the physical devices connected with the appliance. Edge devices that connect directly to appliances communicate with the Raspberry Pi via RF. The system can be controlled by cellphone using the internet and a standard LAN network.
Firmware Developer
I implemented a device reset dispatcher to distinguish between a deep-sleep startup and a hard reset, and a captive portal for the ESP32 access point configuration.
Created a mock Python server using Flask to interact with and send commands to the ESP32, and worked on developing a Node.js-based parser to transform HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files into C strings.
Developed code to display static and dynamically obtained pictures from an external server on the Lilygo screen. Configured timeout and buttons as wake-up sources from deep-sleep modes.
Lastly, added the following:
• Dynamic capability to show nearby networks on the captive portal at runtime.
• A feature to download firmware from an external server (FOTA).
• Support for deep sleep mode to conserve battery
• Battery level detection to warn users about low battery levels
E-locked
Back-end Development for SOP Violation Detection System
Temperature Monitoring for an Egg Storage System
Software Engineer
I also designed and implemented a dedicated firmware system for precise servo motor control, leveraging AWS IoT for real-time communication and command execution.
Finally, I enhanced firmware scalability by transforming it into a plug-and-play solution, allowing users to flash the firmware and deploy immediately without additional configuration.
Education
Master's Degree in Electrical Engineering
Information Technology University - Lahore, Pakistan
Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering
University of Engineering and Technology - Lahore, Pakistan
Certifications
Introduction to the Boost C++ Libraries
Pluralsight
Exploring AWS IoT
Udemy
AWS Serverless APIs & Apps - A Complete Introduction
Udemy
C++ Object Basics: Functions, Recursion, and Objects
Codio | via Coursera
Object Oriented C++: Inheritance and Encapsulation
Codio | via Coursera
C++ Basics: Selection and Iteration
Codio | via Coursera
NumPy Python
Udemy
A Complete Python, TkInter Hands-on
Udemy
Qt 6 Core Beginners with C++
Udemy
Qt 6 Core Intermediate with C++
Udemy
Mastering Visual Studio Code
Udemy
C++ Basic Structures: Vectors, Pointers, Strings, and Files
Codio | via Coursera
C++ Programming—From Scratch to Advanced
Udemy
DevOps Fundamentals
Udemy
Docker for Beginners
Udemy
Master C++ Programming - From Beginner to Advance
Udemy
Python and Flask Demonstrations
Udemy
Introduction to the Internet of Things and Embedded Systems
University of California | via Coursera
Introduction to TCP/IP
Coursera
Data Structures in Python
Udemy
The Foundations of SIP
Udemy
Socket Programming in C from Scratch
Udemy
Skills
Libraries/APIs
Sockets, REST APIs, NumPy, OpenCV, OpenSSL, Azure Active Directory Graph API, Libcurl, Node.js, PayPal API
Tools
GitHub, Git, Jira, MQTT, CMake, Android Studio, MATLAB, Visual Studio, Vault, Makefile, Jenkins, Amazon Cognito, Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS), Keil, cURL Command Line Tool, Boto 3, Qt Creator
Languages
Embedded C, C, C++11, C++, Python, C++14, Embedded C++, Java, Verilog, HTML, JavaScript, HTML5
Paradigms
Socket Programming, Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Microservices, Back-end Architecture, Event-driven Architecture
Platforms
Visual Studio Code (VS Code), Arduino, Linux, Raspberry Pi, Docker, Raspberry Pi 3 GPIO, Amazon Web Services (AWS), AWS IoT, Windows, STM32, Android, AWS Lambda, AWS IoT Core, Bluetooth Low Energy (LE)
Storage
JSON, Databases, Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon S3 (AWS S3), Redis, PostgreSQL
Industry Expertise
High-frequency Trading (HFT)
Frameworks
Qt, Flask, Boost, Google Test
Other
Microcontroller Programming, ESP32, Programming, APIs, Data Structures, Embedded Software, TCP/IP, UDP, Internet of Things (IoT), Embedded Systems, Microsoft Office, Multithreading, Network Programming, Debugging, ESP8266, NodeMCU, Code Review, Analytical Thinking, Microprocessors, PlatformIO, Firmware over the Air (FOTA), HTTP, Firmware, Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), Back-end, GitHub Workflows, GitHub Issues, Tkinter, SIP, ARM, Atmel, Real-time Operating System (RTOS), Printed Circuit Board (PCB), Arduino IDE, Telemetry, Bluetooth, Amazon API Gateway, API Gateways, Prometheus, Microsoft Graph API, Multiprocessing, CSV, Recursion Testing, Fintech, Trading, FIX Protocol, Low-latency Software, Equity Market Data, Financial Market Data, Signal Engine, Options Trading, Stock Trading, Technical Leadership, Leadership, PayPal, Servo Systems, Benchmarking, Low-level Programming, Low Latency, Performance Optimization, Linux Servers
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