pcmn.ac

Paulo César Coutinho

I build software, run a company, and play a few instruments.

I'm from Carpina, in Pernambuco, Brazil, and today I live in Torres Vedras, Portugal, with my family, three kids included. I'm a software engineer: I founded DSPLAY, a digital signage company, and I'm its CTO, and I also work as a Senior Software Engineer at Daltix, a retail data company.

Away from work I play guitar, piano, ukulele and a few other instruments, watch a lot of movies and series (crime, mostly), and like magic, card tricks above all.

The path

More than twenty years of software, from device drivers in C++ to AI coding agents. Roughly in order:

  1. 2005 – 2010 · Recife

    C.E.S.A.R, systems engineer

    My first job, and where I learned most of the basics: web systems, device drivers, embedded apps for phones and network devices, test automation and algorithm optimization.

    C/C++, Java, Flex

  2. 2010 · Recife

    MV Sistemas, and a banking printer API

    Senior developer and architect in an R&D team, on a Java back end with an Adobe Flex front end. On the side, as a consultant, the API for a banking printer.

    Java, JPA, Flex, C/C++

  3. 2010 – 2018 · Recife

    SERPRO, senior analyst and architect

    Large government systems in Java EE, usually as technical lead. From around 2015 I moved to lighter, cloud-based tools and became the one pushing Node.js, React, GraphQL, gRPC and microservices inside the company.

    Java EE, Oracle, Node.js, React, GraphQL, Go, Kubernetes

  4. 2012 – today

    DSPLAY, founder and CTO

    I created it and I'm its lead developer: first the Android player and a PHP and MySQL web manager, then a full rewrite, with a React front end and services on AWS Lambda and containers, plus the players for more platforms.

    Android, Java, PHP, Node.js, React, AWS

  5. 2019 – 2021 · Lisbon

    Aubay Portugal, consultant

    Architecture proposals and reviews for customers, technical estimates for the sales team, and technical interviews for JavaScript roles. Part of that time, working as a full stack developer at Daltix.

  6. 2019 – today · Lisbon

    Daltix, senior software engineer

    I designed the Navigator and Matching Tool web apps, from the front end architecture to the AWS infrastructure, and I still maintain them.

    React, Node.js, AWS Fargate, Terraform, Snowflake

  7. Now

    The agentic era

    These days I build with AI coding agents. I write the rules and the architecture, review what the agents produce, and decide what ships. It changed what I spend my time on, more than it changed what I care about.

Founder & CTO

DSPLAY

A digital signage platform: a dashboard where customers manage their content, and the players that show it on screens in shops, restaurants, hotels and offices. I started it, and I'm still the one who decides how it's built.

dsplay.tv →

Senior Software Engineer

Daltix

A retail data company based in Ghent. Prices, promotions and products, collected and matched at scale. I'm there since 2019.

daltix.com →

Music

Guitar, piano, ukulele…

  • Acoustic guitar (violão)
  • Piano
  • Ukulele
  • and a few more

None of it for a living. My YouTube channel exists to keep songs that are hard to find elsewhere, for people who also play: Lenine more than anyone, plus Caetano Veloso, Iza and others. The takes aren't perfect. They're a memory aid.

Watch on YouTube →

Code

GitHub, since 2012

About forty public repositories, mostly JavaScript and TypeScript, with detours into serverless, GraphQL, React, Go and Java. Some are experiments, some are forks, some are small tools.

github.com/pcmnac →

Home

Carpina to Torres Vedras

From Carpina, in Pernambuco, Brazil. Living in Torres Vedras, in the Lisbon region of Portugal. Father of three.

On the screen

Movies and series

A fan of both, crime above all.

Up my sleeve

Magic

I like magic, card tricks above all.