Technical Leader · Full-Stack Engineer · Entrepreneur
I build things. For over two decades I've turned ideas into working products, from early-stage prototypes to tools that generate revenue and prevent churn.
My career has consistently followed the same pattern: spot an opportunity, prototype a solution, validate it, and either ship it or hand it off to a product team.
At Elsevier, I joined as a full-stack engineer via my own company ServerBiz, building prototypes for ScienceDirect and Scopus, the Scopus Author Feedback Wizard (which doubled researcher feedback and halved support processing time), and the Snowball Metrics Exchange Service (a privacy-first API with public/private key encryption). In 2019 I moved to a permanent position, and later conceived the SciVal Rankings Module, which went from my personal prototype to a shipped product generating new subscriptions.
After leading a data science team for several years, my role shifted in 2025 to focus on what I do best: defining and executing technical projects, mentoring teams, and building.
Before Elsevier, I co-founded and ran three companies, including a hosting provider and a full-service internet company. I have a strong interest in agentic AI engineering and have recently built and modernised multiple web applications entirely through agentic workflows. I thrive in ambiguity, short cycles, and small teams where the goal is to prove or retire ideas quickly.
The pattern: spot an opportunity, build a prototype, validate it, ship it.
Elsevier
Identified the need for ranking analysis tooling, built a personal prototype, pitched it to the SciVal product team. A dedicated team was formed and the module shipped and now supports THE, QS, and U.S. News rankings. Directly responsible for generating new subscriptions and reducing churn.
Elsevier
Designed and built a tool enabling researchers to curate their Scopus author profiles. Automatically determines required operations (merge, split) and processes requests without manual intervention. Significantly increased researcher feedback and reduced processing time for customer support.
Elsevier
Built a dashboard and analytics tool for institutions, plus the Exchange Service: a centralised API with public/private key encryption enabling institutions to share metrics without uploading data to Elsevier.
Enstinet / EKB
Led development across three phases. Built a bespoke web-based dashboard and analytics tool using Laravel and React to visualise research output indexed by the Egyptian Knowledge Bank.
Elsevier
Worked as a full-stack engineer prototyping web applications and interaction designs for ScienceDirect and Scopus during the early development phases of these platforms.
Elsevier
Prototyping, interaction design, and front-end development for a scientific social network enabling social bookmarking in private and public groups.
Japan
Led development of the publication matching service for the Japanese National University Corporation Evaluation, supporting their national research evaluation framework.
Elsevier
Developed data and metrics for a global portal designed to help researchers find collaboration partners for COVID-19 treatment, vaccine development, and related research.
Built and maintained a WordPress plugin for ORCID integration, displaying researcher identifiers on posts, pages, and comments with real-time API validation. Available at github.com/latinvm/wordpress-orcid.
I actively use agentic AI workflows for rapid application development. Recent projects built or modernised entirely through agentic engineering.
Built as both a public-facing website and an internal management tool for a running community in Lansingerland. Fully developed using agentic engineering workflows.
Modernised a wish list platform serving thousands of users from Bootstrap 2 to Bootstrap 5, including a complete overhaul of the underlying codebase. Completed in a single day using agentic engineering.
Automated cryptocurrency trading bot for the Bitvavo exchange with technical analysis (RSI, MACD, Bollinger Bands), paper trading mode, and multi-market portfolio management.
Elsevier · Analytics and Data Services
Elsevier · Research, Analytics and Data Services
ServerBiz
Fury Media
Internet and multimedia projects. Freelance web development for commercial clients.
Renaissance IT
Full-service internet provider. Responsible for business development, hostmaster duties, and web development.
Times Higher Education Asia Universities Summit
Abu Dhabi, 2019
THE Online Masterclasses
Role of Elsevier data in university rankings
Latvian Ministry of Education
Decoding rankings at the university level
Queen's University Belfast & Durham University
Workshops on university rankings
The Hague University of Applied Sciences
Regular interval training with Runnerts.nl (a community I also built the website and management tool for). One or two organised events each year.
Former member of Offline Racing, an amateur team that competed with a BMW E46 M3 at Circuit Zandvoort, achieving sub-2-minute lap times. Hoping to get back behind the wheel.
Implemented the Home Assistant platform for full automation of lighting, heating, cooling, security, and connected devices.