Fractional CTO services

A part-time CTO for companies that need technical judgement but not a full-time executive. We make the technical decisions with you and write them down, check the work and estimates of your developers or agency, help you hire, and answer the questions investors and enterprise customers ask.

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Fractional CTO

From $2,000/month

Usually $2,000–3,500 a month · 30 days' notice

  • Start with a 30-minute call
  • An audit and a written plan in the first month
  • A monthly summary of decisions and open risks
  • Work with your developers or agency

$2,000 a month covers 16 hours; one day a week is $3,500 a month. Paid monthly in advance, cancel with 30 days' notice. See all prices and terms

When you need this

Sound familiar?

  • You are a non-technical founder making technical decisions on your own.
  • An agency or freelancers build your product and nobody checks the code, the estimates or the invoices.
  • Outages, cloud bills or security questions keep coming up and nobody owns them.
  • Investors or a large customer are asking technical questions you cannot answer yet.

What we build

What this covers.

You do not have to build with us. Many companies keep their own developers or another agency, and we act as the technical owner on your side of the table. If you later want us to build part of the product, that is a separate fixed-price stage.

  • Technical direction

    Architecture, stack and build-or-buy decisions made with you and written down, with a roadmap the team can follow.

  • Oversight of developers and vendors

    Code reviews, estimates checked before you sign, and delivered work accepted against what was agreed.

  • Hiring

    Role descriptions, technical interviews and a first-month plan for new developers.

  • Security, reliability and costs

    Access, backups, monitoring and cloud spend reviewed, with fixes ranked by risk.

  • Due diligence and questionnaires

    Technical documents for investors and answers to the security questionnaires enterprise customers send.

What the first three months look like

The first month is an audit. We read the code and the infrastructure, look at the cloud bills, talk to your developers or agency and list every system and vendor the product depends on. You get a written summary: what is solid, what is risky, what it costs to run and what we would change first.

In the second month the most important decisions get made and written down: architecture changes, what to build next and in what order, which vendor does what, and which risks are fixed now or accepted for later. Estimates from your developers or agency are checked against that plan before you approve them.

From the third month the work settles into a rhythm: a weekly call, code and design reviews, hiring when needed, and a short monthly summary of decisions and open risks that you can share with your co-founders or investors.

When a fractional CTO is not the right fit

A part-time role works when the main need is judgement and oversight. It is the wrong choice in a few cases:

  • You need someone managing a large engineering team every day: hire a full-time CTO or engineering manager, and we can help with the hiring.
  • You need the product built rather than overseen: see MVP development or custom software development.
  • You have one question, such as whether a codebase is worth keeping: a single review or the $1,500 scoping sprint answers it without a monthly commitment.

Related work

Closest published work.

Client project · Freight logistics

One system for loads, carriers and the money between them

A load management platform for a freight brokerage: loads, carriers and partner brokers in one place, with payables, receivables and branch reporting built on the same records.

Client project · Hospitality

From hotel booking to guest benefits, without manual steps

An event-driven platform that turns bookings in a host's property management system into guest passes, lets guests claim them in the member app, and keeps both sides in sync when a booking changes.

How it works

A call, a fixed quote, weekly progress.

You describe the problem on a 30-minute call and get a written fixed quote. We build in fixed-price stages and show working software every week, then hand over the code, infrastructure and documentation on your accounts. See all five steps.

Technology

Typical stack.

We choose for the problem and the systems you already run.

  • Architecture reviews
  • Code reviews
  • AWS / Google Cloud
  • TypeScript / Node.js
  • Java / Spring Boot
  • PostgreSQL
  • CI/CD and monitoring
  • Security questionnaires

Fractional CTO: questions.

How much does a fractional CTO cost?

With us, $2,000 a month for 16 hours, or $3,500 a month for one day a week. Both are paid monthly in advance and can be cancelled with 30 days' notice.

What does a fractional CTO actually do?

Owns the technical decisions and their risks: architecture, priorities, oversight of developers and vendors, security and hiring. Each month you get a short written summary of what was decided and which risks are still open.

Do we have to build our product with Readymade?

No. The role works just as well with your own developers or another agency. If you want us to build something later, it is quoted separately as a fixed-price stage.

How do we start?

The first month begins with an audit of the code, infrastructure, costs, team and vendors. You get a written list of risks and a plan for the next three months.

How is the time used?

A regular weekly call, reviews and written decisions between calls, and answers in your team chat during working hours. Hours are planned month by month and do not roll over.

Which time zone do you work in?

We work from UTC+4 and keep regular call windows that overlap with the working day in London and Berlin and the morning in New York.

Do you sign an NDA?

Yes. We are happy to sign your NDA before you share the details.

When can you start?

We confirm the start date in the written quote, once the scope is agreed. We don't promise a date before we know the work.

Is design included?

Where the work has screens, yes: wireframes and interface design for the agreed scope are part of the fixed price. Brand identity or a full design system are quoted separately if you need them.

Have a project in mind?

Book a 30-minute call. If the scope is clear, you get a written fixed quote within one or two business days.

Book a 30-min callSend a brief instead