Get in Touch

Saad Afzal

|

About Experience Skills Projects

Scroll down to explore

About

Get to know me

Helping leaders navigate AI transformation

From clarifying what to build, what to buy, to organizing high-performing technical teams for the AI era.

I'm an engineering leader with 14+ years building software, cloud, and AI systems. Currently I lead a chapter of 20+ AI engineers at Danske Bank, responsible for the enterprise AI platform that serves 20,000+ internal users.

Previously, I spent the first decade of my career developing computational tools and digital-twin systems at global engineering firms (Arup, Ramboll, Atkins, COWI). That foundation in structural engineering and systems design still shapes how I approach platform architecture today—focused on scalability, risk-awareness, and long-term sustainability.

What drives me:

👥

Building high-performing teams

☁️

Platform thinking

⚖️

Responsible AI

I partner with senior leadership to align AI initiatives with business priorities, investment decisions, and regulatory requirements.

Experience

My professional journey

Present

Chief Software Engineer

Danske BankCurrent

Apr 2024 - Present

Serverless development of scalable applications in AWS
Terraform infrastructure as code
Developing production grade GenAI applications for the bank

PythonGolanggooseTypescriptReact.jsDockerTechnical Due DiligenceExecutive AdvisoryTech StrategyAI TransformationLeadershipAI engineeringLangchainTerraform

Dec 2024

Senior Software engineer

Capgemini

Aug 2022 - Dec 2024

Backend development with Python
Certified AWS solution architect
Certified AWS Developer

PythonJavaScriptHTMLCSSNext.jsSeleniumFlaskTypescriptReact.jsAWS Solutions architect CertifiedAWS Developer CertifiedLinuxAI engineeringJava

Jul 2022

Data engineer

Netcompany

Jan 2021 - Jul 2022

ETL pipelines
SQL Query optimisations
Datawarehouse

MySQLPythonMicrosoft SQLPostgress SQL

Jan 2021

Senior Specialist

Cowi

Feb 2018 - Jan 2021

Data Analytics
Application Programming Interfaces
Database design

PythonGrasshopperMicrosoft SQLLinuxHTMLCSSJavaScriptC sharp

Jan 2018

Senior Specialist

Ramboll

Aug 2016 - Jan 2018

Grasshopper scripting
Python scripting and automation
Parametric modelling and design

PythonGrasshopperPython PandasNumpy

Aug 2016

Senior Specialist

Arup Leeds

Jan 2015 - Aug 2016

3D modelling of structures
Geometric Linear and non linear analysis of structures
Python scripting and automation

PythonPython PandasNumpyGrasshopper

Dec 2014

Specialist

Atkins

Jan 2012 - Dec 2014

Python scripting and automation
API interface programming
Software development

Python

Skills

Technical proficiency & leadership capabilities

Technical

HTML100%

Java90%

Python100%

goose100%

Tailwind CSS90%

Terraform100%

Java80%

FastAPI100%

MySQL100%

Python Pandas80%

JavaScript100%

CSS100%

Numpy90%

Typescript80%

AWS Solutions architect Certified100%

Sanity CMS90%

AWS Developer Certified100%

zustand80%

Langchain100%

Microsoft SQL100%

React.js100%

Selenium100%

Grasshopper95%

MongoDB90%

C sharp50%

Svelte60%

Flask100%

Golang80%

Next.js90%

Linux95%

Postgress SQL90%

Chakra UI80%

AI engineering100%

Jenkins90%

Docker90%

Leadership

Executive Advisory100%

Tech Strategy100%

AI Transformation100%

Leadership100%

Technical Due Diligence100%

Projects

Case studies and technical implementations

View Project →

Trello 2.0

This feature-rich app was built using React with Next.js. It combines GPT-4, Drag & Drop, Zustand, Appwrite Cloud, and TypeScript. Key features include a dynamic header with search functionality, intelligent chat suggestions powered by GPT-4, and seamless drag and drop using React Beautiful DnD. Appwrite Cloud ensures secure data management. Zustand provides efficient state management, and TypeScript guarantees type safety throughout the app. The possibilities with the GPT-4 integration will revolutionize project management, allowing users to effortlessly get suggestions on how to organize tasks and store information. Explore the live demo by clicking on the project name.

Next.jsReact.jsTypescriptTailwind CSS

View Project →

IMDB Games

A professional-grade React 18 and TypeScript application for videogame discovery. With Chakra UI, toggle between dark/light modes, search and filter games by genre and platform, and enjoy dynamic page titles. Experience efficient routing with React Router, seamless state management with Zustand, and fast data fetching using React Query. Unleash a new level of gaming discovery with performance optimizations and a smooth user experience.

React.jsHTMLTypescriptChakra UIzustand

View Project →

Airbnb website

This Full Stack Airbnb Clone, powered by Next.js 13, is a feature-rich web application that allows users to browse, search, book, and manage property listings. With a sleek Tailwind design, responsive layout, and various authentication options including credential, Google, and GitHub, users can seamlessly interact with the platform. The integration of Cloudinary CDN enables effortless image uploads, while features like advanced search, favorites, and shareable URL filters enhance the overall user experience. Additionally, the project provides insights into server-side data fetching, error handling, and handling relations between server and child components.

Next.jsReact.jsHTMLTailwind CSSTypescript+2 more

View Project →

Bella AI assistant

"Meet Bella, the voice assistant with a personality! Powered by React and FastAPI, this project combines the best of frontend and backend technologies. With integrated Open AI and Eleven Labs APIs, Bella boasts an impressive knowledge of software development and coding. Through prompt engineering, Bella's responses and mannerisms have been finely tuned to create an immersive and realistic conversational experience. Ask Bella anything, and be amazed by her insightful and personalized answers.

FastAPIPythonReact.js

View Project →

Takeaway restaurant

This project is a dynamic website that has been built from scratch, without relying on any existing frameworks. It utilizes HTML, CSS (specifically flexbox and animations), and JavaScript's Fetch API to fetch menu items from a headless CMS called Sanity. One of the key features of this website is that it allows restaurant owners to easily choose their menu for the week. This is made possible by saving dishes in the CMS, and the JavaScript code automatically fetches the menu items from the CMS API and displays them on the website whenever there is a change. In terms of design and content, the website follows a completely separated approach. This means that the design and the actual website content are independent of each other, allowing for flexibility and easy modifications. To streamline the deployment process, an automatic CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment) pipeline has been set up using GitHub and Vercel. This ensures that any changes made to the code are automatically deployed to the live website without manual interference. Overall, this project demonstrates the capability to create a dynamic website from scratch, utilizing HTML, CSS, and JavaScript with integrations to a headless CMS, and maintaining a seamless deployment process with the help of CI/CD automation.

HTMLCSSJavaScriptSanity CMS

View Project →

Familymatcher

Familymatcher app build with Svelte and deployed on google CDN. Backend in golang using its standard lib. Under the hood postgres + psql and mongoose for migrations.

gooseGolangPostgress SQLSvelteDocker

View Project →

Stock Trading

This app is powered by Python using the Flask framework with Jinja2 templating, and it utilizes SQLite3 for local storage. The front-end design is enhanced with Bootstrap, ensuring a responsive and user-friendly interface. The app is deployed on the Heroku platform for easy access. One of the key features of this app is its integration with the IEX API, which provides real-time stock price data. Users can create accounts, securely log in, and take advantage of various functionalities. They can query stock prices by entering stock symbols, buy and sell shares of stocks with automatic cost calculations, view their transaction history, and change their passwords for added security. By leveraging Python, Flask, Jinja2, SQLite3, Bootstrap, and the IEX API, I have developed an intuitive and efficient virtual stock trading web app. Its user-friendly interface and seamless performance make it a valuable tool for investment management.

PythonJavaScriptHTMLCSSFlask

Contact

Let's connect. Reach out for opportunities, collaborations, or just to say hello.

LinkedIn GitHub