About
João Miguel Marques Silva
Background
I've been in software since before it was called a career. In São Paulo in the late nineties, teaching HTML and ASP to people who'd never touched a command line, building early e-commerce sites for clients who weren't sure the web would last. That early depth matters: I didn't arrive at architecture through abstraction. I arrived through two decades of building things that had to actually work.
The years between shaped everything. Service desk tools. ePub readers. SQL Server automation at Idera. Insurance platforms at Liberty Seguros. By the time I was designing systems at Nova Pontocom, keeping Extra, Ponto Frio, and Casas Bahia online through Black Friday 2012, the pattern was clear: complexity is the enemy, and the only defense is architecture that was designed to last.
From there: Centauro, Brazil's largest sports retailer, where I led the microservices rewrite. Then Porto and Farfetch, a global luxury platform at a scale where every architectural decision had consequences across dozens of countries. Five years translating business requirements into domain reference architectures that could hold up under real load.
Then AI changed the equation. Not as a tool layered onto existing workflows, but as a fundamental redefinition of what software does and who builds it. I didn't treat it like another framework to adopt. I treated it like the phase transition it was. Today, as Head of Engineering at Consulteer, I design AI architectures and deploy autonomous agent systems across aviation, healthcare, and fintech. The stack shifts. The discipline doesn't.
What genuinely absorbs me now is the boundary between AI and software architecture: not AI as a faster way to write code, but as actual autonomous systems that reason, coordinate, and handle complexity that used to require people. I've been building that kind of infrastructure. Watching it work the way it does is something I haven't fully adjusted to yet.
This website is a working example. The architecture, the deployment, the content, built and maintained by an AI agent team. Not as a prototype. Just how I work now.
Experience
Nov 2024 – Present
Porto, Portugal
Head of Engineering — Portugal
Consulteer
Defining technical direction and engineering standards across projects in aviation, healthcare, and fintech. Architecting and enabling AI deployments using agents, models, and MCP-based workflows across OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft, and private deployments. Mentoring engineers and building high-performing teams.
Apr 2024 – Nov 2024
Porto, Portugal
Solutions Architect
Consulteer
Designing and delivering solutions for projects in healthcare, finance, and aeronautics. Database models, reference architectures, and detailed BPMNs. Working across multidisciplinary teams spanning multiple countries and backgrounds.
Aug 2019 – Feb 2024
Porto, Portugal
Senior Enterprise Architect
Farfetch
Translating business requirements into practical technical solutions for a global luxury e-commerce platform. Led content management system revamp consolidating multiple country-specific systems into one. Responsible for domain reference architecture and architectural decision records.
May 2013 – Jul 2019
São Paulo, Brazil
Lead Architect
Centauro (Grupo SBF)
Designed the new e-commerce platform based on microservices and serverless deployments. Implemented CI/CD pipelines, performance analysis in production environments, and coding best practices for integration with external systems.
Nov 2011 – Apr 2013
São Paulo, Brazil
Senior System Architect
Cnova – GPA
Built automated test solutions covering Extra, Ponto Frio, and Casas Bahia. Implemented MongoDB Cluster for denormalized data. Led performance enhancements that kept sites online through Black Friday 2012.
2010 – 2011
São Paulo, Brazil
Senior .NET Developer
Liberty Seguros
Created and maintained internal company services. Contributed to the implementation of Documentum (EMC²) within a SOA architecture.
2010
São Paulo, Brazil
Senior .NET Developer
GEDone
Built software for reading and generating eBooks in ePub format from a web interface. Contributed to the design of a new DRM and digital content management platform.
2007 – 2010
São Paulo, Brazil
QA & Automation Engineer
Idera / KPO – Motorola
Created, coordinated, and executed tests for SQL Server tooling at Idera. Developed automation tools to simulate crashes and environmental failures. At KPO/Motorola, built a training management system used across Brazil.
2007
São Paulo, Brazil
.NET Developer
Yescom / Tribo Interactive
ASP Legacy maintenance and new development in ASP.NET with C#. Built web services for Flash-based UIs, Windows services for async email delivery, and interactive sites using Atlas (Microsoft AJAX).
2006
São Paulo, Brazil
Developer & Development Coordinator
Stefanini IT Solutions
Developed and coordinated eHDM (Electronic Help Desk Manager), a service desk platform built on ASP Legacy and Oracle/SQL Server, with reporting via Crystal Reports. Led migration to ASP.NET 2.0.
2004 – 2005
São Paulo, Brazil
Web Developer
Airfree / Recipress
Built the full e-commerce solution for Airfree's worldwide sites (airfree.com, .com.br, .pt) using ASP Legacy. Developed ASP.NET web services for Flash integrations. At Recipress, designed network infrastructure and configured Active Directory.
2000 – 2004
São Paulo, Brazil
Instructor & Web Developer
Fast Training / PowerLink / POPCOM
Taught HTML, DHTML, ASP, JavaScript, Access, and SQL Server. Developed web applications using ASP Legacy and SQL Server. Created interactive Flash-connected sites and network supervision at oncology and education institutions.