Afanasy Barbarov Backend Engineer & Tech Lead

Building production systems in Rust, Go & TypeScript. Based in Germany.

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Guess who made this site Afanasy Barbarov

Backend engineer who builds production systems that actually work. Currently writing Go and TypeScript by day at Volkswagen Group Charging GmbH (Elli), while building side projects in Rust. Moving deeper into Rust for its memory safety, performance, and the joy of writing correct code.

Drawn to problems where automation meets complex technical domains — parsing OCPP protocols at scale, extracting chemical data with LLMs, or building WebAssembly applications that run offline. 15 years of shipping code has taught me that pragmatic solutions beat perfect designs that never launch.

Focused on energy and green tech. Whether it's EV charging networks or battery materials discovery, I'm drawn to hard technical problems that matter. The energy transition needs people who build and ship working systems.

Always happy to discuss interesting technical challenges around Rust, Go, and TypeScript — especially in infrastructure, distributed systems, or energy/materials domains. If your team is tackling something in this space, reach out. Based in Germany.

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Senior Software Engineer | Tech Lead, Volkswagen Group Charging GmbH (Elli)

Building backend systems for the EV revolution at scale. Working with OCPP protocols to manage 900,000+ charging stations, developing services in TypeScript, JavaScript, and Go on Google Cloud Platform with Kubernetes. Implementing observability with OpenTelemetry. Leading technical decisions, optimizing costs, and systematically eliminating technical debt while maintaining high availability for critical charging systems.

Achievements

  • Built and maintained charging station infrastructure for 900,000+ charging stations, deep-diving into OCPP protocol implementation to debug edge cases in charger connectivity and state management
  • Reduced cloud infrastructure costs through systematic optimization of database queries, caching strategies, and resource allocation across GCP services
  • Improved deployment pipeline efficiency, cutting build times from 15-20 minutes to under 10 minutes by parallelizing test execution and optimizing Docker builds
  • Led technical decisions and architecture reviews, focusing on pragmatic solutions that ship rather than perfect designs that don't
  • Systematically refactored legacy TypeScript and Go codebases while maintaining 100% uptime, eliminating technical debt incrementally
  • Maintained security compliance and prepared documentation for ISO27001 audits

Solutions Architect | Tech lead, Apaleo GmbH

Worked on an API-first hotel property management platform serving properties in 24+ countries, including major chains like easyHotel (40+ hotels) and citizenM (7,500 rooms). Led projects to improve the UI and API developer experience, migrated AWS infrastructure to Terraform for better scalability, and prepared systems for NF525 and SOC2 certifications. Streamlined CI/CD processes, built apps for Apaleo's marketplace, and handled on-call support for critical customer issues.

Achievements

  • Supported platform serving 7,500+ hotel rooms across major chains (easyHotel, citizenM) in 24+ countries, ensuring high availability for critical hospitality operations
  • Prepared IT infrastructure for SOC2 certification, working closely with compliance and security teams to meet enterprise security standards
  • Migrated AWS infrastructure to Terraform for better scalability, infrastructure-as-code practices, and audit compliance
  • Prepared the product for NF525 certification (legal/fiscal compliance)
  • Improved customer and developer experience through API and UI enhancements, advised teams during API design sessions, built marketplace apps
  • Optimized CI/CD pipelines by improving Jenkins builds and introducing GitHub Actions workflows
  • Established on-call processes with runbooks, provided critical customer support and incident resolution

Senior Software Engineer, TekLabs (contractor for Mtech.fi)

Led development of NCDX (Nordic Cattle Data eXchange), a major agricultural data exchange API serving 200,000+ farms and processing data for 20M+ cows globally. Designed and implemented RESTful APIs that became a critical part of the Nordic agricultural digital ecosystem, enabling seamless data flow between farm management systems, dairy processors, and government agencies.

Built both client and server applications using Angular and .NET, set up cross-browser testing pipelines with Selenium/Docker/Aerokube, and migrated multiple projects from ASP.NET MVC to .NET Core while helping other teams adopt the new platform. Enhanced API documentation and developer experience using React and Swagger.

Achievements

  • Led development of NCDX (Nordic Cattle Data eXchange), processing data for 200,000+ farms and 20M+ cows globally, becoming critical infrastructure for the Nordic agricultural ecosystem
  • Designed and implemented RESTful APIs that enabled seamless data exchange between farm management systems, dairy processors, and government agencies across multiple Nordic countries
  • Built full-stack applications (Angular/.NET) and migrated multiple projects from ASP.NET MVC to .NET Core while helping other teams adopt the new platform
  • Configured end-to-end testing pipelines for cross-browser compatibility using Selenium, Docker, and Aerokube
  • Enhanced API developer experience through improved Swagger documentation and React-based UI components

Projects

Side projects where I explore Rust, WebAssembly, and LLM automation. From full-stack Rust PWAs to AI-powered research tools — building things that solve real problems.

What I've Built

  • matgen.ai (Go, JavaScript) - A platform for chemical data extraction, helping researchers discover new battery materials by automating data collection from scientific literature. Currently serving materials science research teams.
  • lamp.matgen.ai (Rust, htmx, NATS, OpenTelemetry, LGTM stack) - An AI-powered patent analysis assistant that helps researchers navigate prior art and identify opportunities in materials science patents. Backend built in Rust with async message processing and full observability via OpenTelemetry + Grafana LGTM stack.
  • firstfile.ru (Go, JavaScript) - An automated patent submission platform that eliminates manual paperwork, reducing filing time from days to hours for chemical patent applications.
  • cheatmeal.barbarov.com (Rust, Leptos, WebAssembly) - A full-stack Rust PWA for meal prep planning. Built with Leptos compiled to WASM, featuring offline-first architecture, SQLite persistence via OPFS, and undo/redo history. Helps athletes manage recipes, weekly meal plans, and auto-generate shopping lists with macro tracking.

Recent Writing

Sharing infrastructure lessons from building production systems at scale. From service mesh configuration to observability stacks, documenting the hard-won knowledge from deploying critical infrastructure.

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