Fractional CTO Services | Solfreaks CTO on Demand

Solfreaks CTO on Demand puts a senior technical person next to your founders for a few hours a week, or for a fixed review, without the cost of a full-time hire. They help you decide what to build and how, who should build it, and whether what has been built is any good.

The work here is advice and leadership, not a development shop. A fractional CTO reads the architecture, talks to your developers and vendors, and gives you a straight answer on questions you can't judge yourself. That gap is where many non-technical founders lose time and money.

What a fractional CTO does for you

Technology strategy. A short written view on stack choices, build-versus-buy decisions and which risks to take now rather than later.
Architecture review. We read your system design and code, then tell you what will cope with growth, what won't, and what is merely untidy.
Vendor and agency oversight. We help you write the brief, compare quotes, sit in status calls and notice when a delivery is drifting.
Hiring support. Job descriptions, technical interviews and an opinion on candidates, so you aren't hiring on confidence alone.
Budgets and roadmaps. Estimates you can plan around, and a roadmap that separates what must happen this quarter from what is merely interesting.
Code and security audits. An independent look at the code, the cloud set-up and who has access to what, ending in a prioritised list of fixes.
Investor due-diligence preparation. We find what a technical reviewer would flag and help you fix or explain it before they ask. We can't promise an investor will say yes.

Two ways to work together

The first is a one-off review: a fixed piece of work such as an architecture and code review, delivered as a written report and a call to walk through it. It suits a founder who has an agency or a freelancer building the product and wants a second opinion before paying the next invoice.

The second is a monthly retainer. You get a weekly call, availability on chat between calls and a standing agenda that covers the roadmap, the team, the vendors and the risks. Decisions are written down, so they don't live in one person's head.

What the first month looks like

Intro call and access. You explain the business and the goals, and we ask for read-only access to the repositories, the cloud accounts and any project tracker.
Read and listen. For the first couple of weeks we read the code, talk to your developers and any agency, and go through the technical side of vendor contracts. We aren't lawyers, so we flag what to take to one.
Written findings. A short document covering what's healthy, what's risky and what to do first, usually ready two to three weeks after we get access.
Weekly rhythm. The call starts, the first priorities are agreed and the first decisions get recorded.
Month-end check. We review progress and budget with you and decide whether to carry on, reduce the hours or stop.

What we won't do, and who shouldn't hire us

A fractional CTO will not write most of your code. If you also need people to build, you can hire dedicated developers or have us deliver a project such as a SaaS MVP. We should be upfront about the conflict of interest: when we advise and also build, the advice should be checked. We'll recommend someone else where that is the better answer for you, and you can bring in an outside reviewer whenever you like.

We're probably the wrong fit if you want a co-founder who takes equity and works on the company full-time, or if your engineering organisation is big enough to need a leader on site every day. If an old app has simply fallen over, you need repairs and not advice. That is closer to a legacy app revamp, though a review is often the first step. We give technical advice, not legal, tax or investment advice.

Fees, hours and lead time

Fees depend on how many hours a month you need, how complex the system is, how many vendors or developers we have to coordinate and the seniority of the person you need. A one-off review is priced as a fixed piece of work. A retainer is a monthly fee for an agreed amount of time, and you can change that amount as your needs change. Most reviews take a couple of weeks, and a retainer can usually start within a week of the first call. The quote follows a short discovery call.

Why Solfreaks for technical leadership

Our advice on mobile comes from shipping, not from reading about it: we have published apps on Google Play, and we work from Rawalpindi on Pakistan time with clients in the UK, the Gulf and at home. You speak to the same person every week, and every document we write for you, from audits to architecture notes, is yours to keep. If you'd like a straight look at your technology, book a short call and tell us what's worrying you.

Open-source tools and references

A few public projects that come up a lot in this kind of work. They belong to other people and teams. We link to them because they are worth a look, not because anyone pays us to.

donnemartin/system-design-primerLearn how to design large-scale systems.
architecture-decision-record/architecture-decision-recordTemplates and examples for architecture decision records.

Frequently asked questions

How much of the CTO's time do we actually get?

That is agreed when we set up the retainer. Most founders begin with a weekly call, chat access between calls and a block of hours for deeper work, such as reading code or sitting in on a vendor meeting. If a month turns out quieter or busier than planned, we adjust the hours at the monthly check instead of letting the arrangement drift.

Is there a conflict of interest if Solfreaks also builds software?

Yes, a possible one, and we would rather say it than hide it. If we recommend that you build something with us, you should get a second opinion. Many clients use us purely as advisers while another agency or an in-house team does the building. That arrangement is fine, and our advice shouldn't change because of it.

Will you help us prepare for investor technical due diligence?

Yes. We review the code, the infrastructure, security basics, data handling and who owns what, then give you a list of the gaps a reviewer is likely to raise and help you close or explain them. We can't promise how an investor will react, and we don't give financial or legal advice.

Can you work alongside our existing tech lead?

Yes, and this happens often. A tech lead sometimes wants a second opinion on architecture, hiring or a vendor choice, or has no one senior to talk things through with. We work with them and not around them, and the engagement can be limited to the topics you choose.

Which technologies can you advise on?

Mobile apps on Android and iOS, backends and APIs, cloud hosting and release pipelines, web products, and the sensible use of AI features. We're less useful for deep hardware design or heavily regulated medical devices. If your system sits outside what we know well, we'll say so on the first call.