Fractional CTO · 2 seats open Q3

The technical co-founder you didn't get when you started.

Fractional CTO for companies doing $1M to $20M with no developers on staff. I figure out what your business needs built. Then I build it. Custom tools. AI workflows. Dashboards that tell you the truth.

$5,000/MO
Flat retainer
ALWAYSON
In the company w/ you
1–12MO
Engagement length
Christian Schwagereit, fractional CTO
Trusted by 7-figure operators
Royal Legal SolutionsMadLemonMediaTour AffiliatePinnacle Life GroupTurfSafariIssued PaidRoyal Legal SolutionsMadLemonMediaTour AffiliatePinnacle Life GroupTurfSafariIssued Paid
An open letter

There's a six-figure leak in your operation.
Nobody on your team can fix it.

Most growing businesses hit the same wall.

Your spreadsheets started off fine… Now nobody trusts them. You're paying for five different tools that don't talk to each other. You have an admin sending the same follow-up email a hundred times a week because no system does it for them. Every other operations meeting ends with someone saying this and that should be automated… But nothing ever does.

So the work that would actually move the business never gets done. Updating the website that was built by your nephew in 2011. The custom dashboard you've sketched on a whiteboard three times. The AI that could handle your invoicing follow-ups. The internal tool that would finally tie your operation together.

You are not a tech startup so you won't hire engineers. Hiring a single good developer takes six months and a six-figure salary, and that's before you find out whether they actually understand your business well enough to build something useful. An agency builds you one thing for $50,000, hands it over with a manual, and is gone by the time you realize you needed something different. And a full-time CTO costs $300,000 a year plus equity for a role the company doesn't yet have enough work for.

That's why I exist.

The four ways to get this done

Only one of them is all four things at once.

Me
Fractional CTO
Agency
Project work
Freelancer
Solo developer
Full-time CTO
$300K hire
Annual cost
$60,000
$50–150K
$120K+
$300K↑ + equity
Decides what to build
Writes the code
Rarely
In the business with you
Stays past launch
Maybe
You own everything built
Sometimes

What I actually do

I'm your CTO and your developer in one person. I figure out what your business needs built. Then I build it.

There's no team for me to manage. No agency in the middle. No contractor I have to chase. I am the resource. When you tell me a problem, I write the code that fixes it.

01

I decide what to build.

I sit in your meetings and own the technical calls. What gets built. What we buy off the shelf. What we kill before it wastes a quarter.

02

I write the code.

Custom internal tools. AI that handles your repetitive work. Dashboards. Integrations between the tools you already pay for. Customer apps when it makes sense.

03

I stay on the phone.

Slack. Email. Phone. 10pm on a Tuesday when something breaks. I’m in the company with you, not punching a clock.

What “I write the code” actually means

Every business is different, but the patterns repeat. After a few weeks inside your operation I'll know which of these you actually need. Some of them you'll have inside the first month. Others get built later as the business grows into them.

Custom CRMs

Built around how your sales actually flow. Not the rigid pipeline some vendor decided you should have.

AI sales assistants

Drafts your follow-ups, scores your leads, surfaces the ones worth your time today.

Internal dashboards

The numbers that actually run the business, in one screen. Live, not pasted from yesterday.

Workflow automations

The "this should be automated" things that never get automated. They get automated.

Quotes & invoices

One click to send. Auto-follow-up if it sits unread. The chase is gone.

Client portals

Self-serve where it makes sense. Fewer "where are we at" emails, more billable work shipped.

Inventory & capacity

When stock, jobs, or hours are part of the business. Always-current, no Friday-night spreadsheet.

Integration glue

The tools you keep, finally talking to each other. One source of truth instead of seven.

On a typical week I'll be in two of your meetings, shipping code for three of your priorities, on the phone with you about a fourth, and quietly killing a fifth one that nobody needs anymore.

The first useful thing I build usually goes live inside the first month. Small, but it works. From there the systems get layered on as the business needs them. The list grows the longer I'm there.

What changes

Six months in, the business runs differently.

Today
5+
SaaS tools glued together
~30 hrs
a week on manual admin
Stale
spreadsheets nobody trusts
"Soon"
when anything gets automated
Six months in
1
internal system, custom-built
~0 hrs
on the things AI now handles
Live
dashboards, one source of truth
Done
the things that should be automated

Who this works for

Companies doing $1M to $20M in revenue with no engineering team and no plans to hire one. Service businesses. Agencies. Operators in specific industries. Anyone where software is becoming a bigger part of the business faster than you can keep up with.

If a 30-minute conversation with you would surface five things software should be doing for you that nothing currently does, you're the person I wrote this for.

Who this doesn't work for

If you already have developers on staff and you need someone to manage them, you don't need me. You need a full-time CTO.

If you want one specific app built and never touched again, hire an agency. They'll be cheaper for that one job.

And if what you want is someone who nods along in meetings and tells you everything looks great, I'll be the wrong fit by week two.

Here's what that's looked like across actual businesses.

Three companies. Different industries. Same pattern: outgrew their spreadsheets and stitched-together SaaS, didn't want to hire engineers, brought me in. What I built for each of them and what changed.

Royal Legal Solutions

Legal services
Fractional CTO · 9-month engagement
We reclaimed 100+ hours weekly that was previously spent on administrative busywork. Eliminated $7,400 in monthly SaaS costs. Our client intake process that once required 3 full-time employees now runs completely on autopilot — with higher accuracy and client satisfaction scores.

Royal Legal Solutions

100+
Hours saved on inefficiencies due to disconnected SaaS products.

MadLemon Media

Media & content
Fractional CTO · 12-month engagement
Our operations were crippled by 14 different SaaS subscriptions that still required manual data transfers between them. Within 60 days of implementing our Systematik solution, we consolidated to just two systems, fully automated our client delivery process, and watched our profit margins expand by 32% overnight.

MadLemon Media

9
Disconnected SaaS products replaced by 1 custom-architected marketing, sales and operations system.

What the first 90 days inside your business look like.

If you bring me in, here's the shape of the first three months. Most of the value comes from phases 3 and 4. Phases 1 and 2 are the part most consultants skip.

01Week 1

I learn the business

I get added to your Slack and your team meetings. I read the contracts, the SaaS bills, the data you have, the last 90 days of notes. I meet every person who matters and I watch how the work actually flows. No deliverables this phase. I am building the map.

02Week 2

I write up what I found

A plain-English plan. What to build, what to buy off the shelf, what to kill, and where AI pays back the fastest. You can argue with it before I touch any code. We sequence the build together. No slide deck.

03Week 3 onward

I build

I write the code. Weekly demos, weekly deploys. The first useful thing usually ships inside the first month. Small, but it works. From there the systems get layered on as priorities shift. Internal tools, AI workflows, dashboards, integrations, customer apps when they make sense.

04Ongoing

I keep operating

Once the core systems are running, my time shifts into maintenance, iteration, and the next thing the business needs. I stay as long as it is creating value. When the company is genuinely ready for a full-time engineer, I help you hire them.

How I price it.

One flat monthly retainer. No hourly invoices, no scope arguments, no per-meeting line items. You know what it costs from day one, and you can end it at the close of any month past the minimum.

Fractional CTO retainer
$5,000/ month

1-month minimum. Most engagements run 6 to 12 months. End it at the close of any month after the minimum, no questions asked.

What the seat covers
  • 01I own the technical roadmap. What gets built, what we buy, what we kill before it wastes a quarter.
  • 02I write the code. Custom internal tools, AI workflows, dashboards, integrations between the tools you already pay for.
  • 03I roll out AI inside the workflows you already run. Sales follow-ups, ops, finance close, support inbox.
  • 04I sit in your meetings. Your Slack, your standups, the room where the decisions actually get made.
  • 05I stay on the phone. Slack, email, calls. 10pm on a Tuesday when something breaks. I’m in the company with you.
  • 06A weekly written update so the rest of leadership knows what shipped and what didn’t.
  • 07You own everything I build. Code, infrastructure, documentation. It belongs to your company, not mine.
Get a free 30-minute call

Stop letting your operation leak six figures. Book a call.

Pick a time. 30 minutes. No deck, no pitch. I'll ask what's broken and what isn't getting done, and tell you straight whether I can help.

  • A quick read of where your operation is leaking time and money right now.
  • A first-pass sketch of what custom software would actually do for your business.
  • A rough ROI estimate before you commit to anything.
  • A direct answer on whether I’m the right fit. No hard sell.
2 seats open this quarter
May 2026
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P.S. The best time to fix the software side of your business is before it's on fire.

By the time the manual workarounds become unbearable, you've usually spent two years and a few hundred thousand dollars getting there. The spreadsheets nobody trusts. The SaaS subscriptions that don't talk to each other. The team hiring admins to keep up with admin work. The whole thing was avoidable.

If you've read this far, you already know whether you're the person I wrote this for. A 30-minute call costs nothing. At the end of it I'll tell you straight whether I'm the right fit or not.

Talk soon,
Christian Schwagereit
Fractional CTO · 2 seats open this quarter
Christian Schwagereit
★ Senior dev
▶ Available
/* stack */
TS · Python · AI · Postgres · Stripe