Robert Black

Senior Software Developer with 20+ years of experience in Java development, software quality engineering, DevOps, automation, and performance engineering. Proven expertise designing scalable backend systems, event-driven architectures, CI/CD pipelines, automated testing frameworks, and cloud-based solutions. Strong experience with Java, Spring Boot, Docker, Kafka, Pulsar, BigQuery, Oracle, Redis, Python, and Selenium in Agile environments.

Senior Software Developer at Beyond.com (2023-02 – Present)

• Designed and developed scalable backend applications using Java and Spring Boot to support high-performance systems.
• Leveraged AI-assisted development tools including Claude and LLM-based assistants to improve code quality and automated test coverage.
• Utilized Claude to build customer-facing React components and streamline modern frontend workflows.
• Implemented event-driven architecture solutions using Apache Pulsar for scalable messaging and data streaming.
• Optimized data storage and analytics workflows using Google BigQuery and Oracle databases.
• Containerized applications using Docker to improve deployment consistency across development and QA environments.

Senior Software Development Engineer in Test (SDET) at Overstock.com (2018-06 – 2023-02)

• Designed, built and deployed Java-based applications to support enterprise pricing infrastructure.
• Improved application performance by restructuring data models and offloading Oracle workloads using Redis.
• Modernized legacy architecture with Kafka and Apache Pulsar event-driven streaming platforms.
• Migrated large-scale data platforms from Teradata to BigQuery to improve scalability and analytics performance.
• Built CI/CD automation frameworks with containerized mock services and reporting tools.
• Developed monitoring dashboards using Graphite and Grafana to track system performance and operational metrics.
• Collaborated with business stakeholders to automate analytics workflows using Python-based solutions.

Software Quality Engineer at Sorenson Media (2017-03 – 2018-05)

• Developed automated testing frameworks using Ruby, Selenium WebDriver, and Cucumber.
• Created Python monitoring tools to track database and application health.
• Designed load testing solutions using Vegeta and Golang with custom reporting capabilities.
• Automated AWS S3 content management processes using Python scripting.
• Built Docker-based virtual client environments to support production monitoring and troubleshooting.

Software Development Lead at Overstock.com (2010-07 – 2017-02)

• Built and managed Performance Engineering and Release Management teams.
• Owned releases for high-visibility public-facing ecommerce applications, increasing deployment success rates to near 100%.
• Reduced operational costs by migrating from LoadRunner to customized JMeter-based performance testing solutions.
• Built performance reporting applications using BIRT and Oracle.
• Managed DevOps operations while reducing team headcount without impacting service delivery.
• Automated deployment workflows using Jira and Perl scripting.
• Led automation framework ownership using Java, Selenium WebDriver, and Hibernate.

Software Performance Engineer at Overstock.com (2010-04 – 2010-06)

• Designed performance testing scenarios to validate scalability, stability, and reliability under production workloads.
• Analyzed and presented performance metrics and operational reports to stakeholders.
• Developed and maintained automated performance tests using LoadRunner.

Software Quality Engineer at Overstock.com (2008-06 – 2010-04)

• Certified Scrum Master with experience supporting Agile software development teams.
• Helped build internal Java-based Selenium WebDriver automation frameworks.
• Created SOX-compliant test plans and automated test strategies.
• Performed performance testing using JMeter and caching validation methodologies.

Associate of Science in Computer Science – CCI (1997 – 1999)

– University of Utah (1994 – 1996)