Fractional iOS CTO & Founding iOS Engineer

Yes. Three to six months usually maps to the founding-engineer or interim-lead arrangements above: I build the app, or hold the lead seat while you run the full-time search. The fractional-CTO retainer is the open-ended version at one to three days a week.

Different jobs. A senior engineer mostly writes code and reviews other people's. A fractional CTO does some of that too, but spends most of the week on hiring, roadmap, and architecture decisions, and often ends up involved in backend or cross-platform calls that touch the iOS app. If you already have an iOS lead and need more hands, a senior engineer is the right hire. If you don't, or your lead is stretched thin, fractional makes more sense.

3-month minimum, extendable month-to-month after. Shorter than that and I can't learn your codebase, team, and roadmap fast enough to be useful. Most retainers run 4-8 months in practice.

Yes, this is often the end-state. I run the technical interview loop, write the job description, and help the founder evaluate candidates. The engineer we hire often inherits the patterns I've established, which shortens their ramp-up.

0 engineers (you're pre-hire and need an iOS app shipped), 1-2 engineers (they need senior oversight), or 3-5 engineers (you need a lead but don't want a full-time one). Above 5-8 engineers, you probably need a full-time CTO.

Both. At fractional cadence, I write the code for high-risk modules and pair with the team on the rest. Pure advisory engagements are available too but usually aren't what founders need.

Directly - you're hiring me, one senior iOS engineer who writes the code, rather than an agency that routes you through a project manager and a team you never meet. For a lot of my clients that's the whole point: one person who owns the work end to end.

A quick call can happen within days. For project work I usually need 1-2 weeks to clear the calendar, though I keep some buffer for urgent firefighting.

Yes, from pre-seed to Series C and beyond. For very early teams, a short advisory engagement often makes more sense than a full build: you get the architecture guidance without committing to a large piece of work before you've validated the product.

Everything: code, architecture decisions, code review, documentation, async Slack availability during working hours. No surprise add-ons. I bill for time spent working on your project, not for "thinking about it in the shower."

I'm currently in Vancouver (PST), with full overlap for North American teams. For UK and Europe, I'm online by their afternoon. For Gulf or APAC, we'd agree on overlap hours and handle the rest async. I've worked with teams from San Francisco to Dubai.