Nick DiZazzo
Staff Software Engineer
I build locally-focused AI infrastructure that makes machine learning more intuitive and accessible. Over the last 15+ years in software engineering, I've focused on building things that people actually want to use—from games and web applications to better developer tools.
Intro
What I'm all about
I was 6 years old when I disassembled my first computer and since then, I've known that I love everything about technology. Today, I'm focused on making artificial intelligence accessible and secure for individuals while exploring the cutting edge of what's possible through machine learning.
I'm passionate about helping organizations find the right balance between cloud and local computing. Every team has different needs—some benefit from cloud flexibility, others need local control for privacy or compliance. I work on software that gives organizations choices, so they can deploy where it makes the most sense for their situation.
Open-source Projects
Helping other developers
task-engine
task-engine is a robust, type-safe Go framework for automating complex task workflows with actions for Docker, file, and system operations.
SwiftChain
SwiftChain is a educational framework I used to explain implementation details of a blockchain, written in Swift.
Stellar Wallet
Primary contributor & maintainer of BlockEQ's iOS Wallet, helping people take back control of their finances with Stellar.
Expertise
What I do best
01
AI Platform Architecture
Designing and building AI infrastructure that prioritizes open-source foundation models and community-driven AI, with support for leading platforms including Meta, IBM, and NVIDIA. Specializing in secure, on-premise AI solutions that address compliance requirements while maintaining high performance and scalability.
02
Back-end Development
Building back-end systems for collecting and aggregating analytics data, APIs for servicing web and mobile applications, as well as complex multi-container applications.
03
Mobile Development
Specializing in mobile development while building performant and delightful apps in iOS. Crypto wallets, AR experiments, contact data synchronization, and smart-home integrations are some notable experiences I've worked on.
04
Blockchain & Cryptocurrency
Certified Bitcoin Professional with extensive experience in blockchain technologies, cryptocurrency systems, and distributed ledger implementations. Led development of cryptocurrency wallets and trading platforms with focus on security and user experience.
05
Swift
Advanced level in writing Swift code for clients, servers, or the command line. I follow Swift development proposals very closely, and have also helped identify improvements to Swift.
06
Objective-C / C++ / C
Strongly experienced in C-family programming languages - requiring thorough understanding of the deployment platform, they reward you with the maximum amount of performance and flexibility.
Experience
Where I've worked
Leading AI innovation at Lemony.ai, building AI products as an IBM Watsonx Technology Partner. Focused on helping teams adopt secure edge-AI products that provide them with AI productivity enhancements, while maintaining data privacy and compliance.
November 2024 – Present
Lemony.ai
Uptime IndustriesStaff Software Engineer
Toronto, ON
Leading the development of AI products at Lemony.ai, focusing on secure edge-AI software that support multiple open-source and modern models from IBM, JetBrains, Meta, and NVIDIA.
Developed the core product for Lemony nodes that enables RAG and local document analysis without sending data to AI providers, addressing critical AI compliance requirements.
Developed intelligent search using vector embeddings that understands context and intent, enabling users to find relevant content even when using different terminology than the original documents.
Enabled our IBM Watsonx Technology Partnership, integrating IBM Granite models for enterprise-grade AI compliance and data privacy.
Enabled our JetBrains Partnership, integrating Mellum code models for locally-powered software development.
April 2020 – November 2024
Block (Square)
Software Engineer
Toronto, ON · Remote
Developed critical components supporting the iOS codebase's migration to be built by Bazel, netting a 60% speedup on our CI pipeline and local development machines.
Designed and developed a novel system to process build data from Bazel iOS builds to provide insights (distributed failure aggregation, analytics) into developer builds.
Built a horizontally scalable (AWS lambda) application framework on the GitHub task-force to assist in migrating Block's repositories from Bitbucket to GitHub, and migrated the iOS monorepo.
Assisted in Apple Silicon migration for iOS codebase and its dependencies.
March 2019 – 2020
Coinsquare
Principal iOS Engineer
Toronto, ON
Led development for the company's native iOS projects (internal / external), build systems, and design patterns.
Worked closely with our engineering director to hire and manage a team of intermediate & senior mobile developers.
Collaborated with back-end teams to rebuild microservices for many different system areas and devised strategies to reduce our front-end client workload by unifying them with shared GraphQL queries.
Advised product teams on best-practices for mobile features, designs, and implementation.
2018 - March 2019
Block Equity / StellarX
Principal iOS Engineer (Multiple Roles)
Defined how BlockEQ built mobile products that customers would enjoy using and took BlockEQ's App Store presence to the next level by providing elegant designs, and published technical articles.
Led development efforts to build native mobile apps for StellarX, a decentralized exchange for the Stellar ecosystem.
Devised strategies to manage secure cryptocurrency data: encryption for data at rest and in motion.
Frequently contributed to open-source projects which support Stellar development, and collaborated with SDF members to encourage developer adoption.
2015 – 2018
TWG
Tech Lead / Senior Mobile Engineer
Toronto, ON
Led technical initiatives for client projects; worked closely with product managers to estimate technical scope and tasks.
Provided development and technical guidance for startups - helped evolve product visions and scale their development teams.
Led development teams in numerous mobile projects and helped hire & onboard new developers to the company.
Developed and maintained in-house frameworks to expedite project ramp-up and development time.
2013 – 2015
Metroland Media
Mobile Developer
Toronto, ON
Repurposed a REST API that aggregated data from several legacy MySQL databases, and integrated it with new data sources to maintain compatibility with existing mobile apps.
Coordinated development on revamping WagJag mobile app, using Appcelerator as an application development framework.
2012 – 2013
GLU Mobile
Game Programmer
Toronto, ON
Released several game titles, including Zombies Ate My Friends, Knights of Puzzelot, and Campers!
Lead engineer on Zombies Ate My Friends, which was prominently featured on Apple's iOS App Store and Google Play.
Developed and extended a custom multi-platform game engine using OpenGL ES (iOS, Android, and OSX).
Built countless tools and exporters for artists & designers to manipulate game data.
2011 – 2012
Gameloft
Game Programmer
Toronto, ON
Released two game titles, with one being featured by Apple on the app store.
Developed game-play mechanics, networking and social components for Urban Crime, and UNO & Friends.
Created an extensible 2D animation system for simple object motion.
2009 – 2010
IBM Canada Ltd.
DB2 Cloud Developer
Toronto, ON
Worked on IBM's Database as a Service (DBaaS) team to help develop a cloud-based ecosystem for DB2 - a proof of concept to provision multi-node databases with DB2 PureScale.
Investigated new hardware-based technology delivery platforms for the DBaaS project.
2009 – 2009
IBM Canada Ltd.
DB2 Application Developer
Toronto, ON
Implemented scalability changes to support parallel execution across hundreds of database nodes.
Reduced report output transmission size for large database health reports by up to 50%.
2007 – 2008
IBM Canada Ltd.
DB2 Technologist
Toronto, ON
Designed and developed an extensible, highly scalable, distributed P2P framework allowing the automation of thousands of remote machines.
Additional system capabilities included remote monitoring of systems, system control, application control, batch execution of commands to manage clustered machines, etc.
The framework had successful applications at Information on Demand in Las Vegas, 2007, SAP Tech. Ed. Orlando, 2008 and Information on Demand Europe, 2008.
Education
How I spent a lot of money
2005 – 2011
Western University
B.Sc. Specialization Computer Science
Minor in Game Development
London, ON
Internship: Selected for the Science Internship program and hired by IBM Canada.
Extra Curricular: Vice President of External Affairs, Computer Science Student Society.