Hi, I am Thomás

Thomás Horta

Senior Software Engineer

Software Engineer with 7+ years of experience in Android Development, having built apps used by millions of people all around the world. Passionate about software development and always keen to learn and share knowledge about new technologies, frameworks, and programming languages to deliver high-performance, high-quality, well-tested, and accessible products.

Self-motivated professional consistently recognized as a technical reference and always interested in delivering real value to the end-users by figuring out where the product and customers' needs meet.

Besides programming, I also enjoy games (digital and board games) and playing music!

Leadership
Team Work
Communication
Adaptability
Fast Learner
Problem Solving

Experiences

1
Senior Android Mobile Engineer
Automattic

November 2022 - June 2024, Remote

Distributed company behind WordPress.com, WooCommerce, Jetpack, Pocket Casts, Tumblr, and other products. On a mission to democratize publishing and commerce so that anyone with a story can tell it, and anyone with a product can sell it, regardless of income, gender, politics, language, or where they live in the world.

Responsibilities:
  • Worked on the open-source WordPress and Jetpack Android apps, focusing on the Reader experience and ensuring intuitive UI using Material guidelines.
  • Made technical decisions and worked on feature initiatives, collaborating with Backend and Design teams to define technical requirements and UI specs.
  • Utilized modern Android development practices including Kotlin, Coroutines, Flows, MVVM, unit testing, and advocating for using Jetpack Compose for new features.
  • Acted as a reference for debugging and resolving complex issues, enhancing user experience, reviewing major pull requests, and improving the app’s crash-free rate.
  • Coordinated asynchronously with distributed teams using Slack, WordPress’ P2 platform, and GitHub.
Senior Software Engineer
HOMER

July 2021 - August 2022, Remote (New York, NY, United States)

Ed Tech company, on a mission to give kids the best start to their learning journey, crafting amazing apps and experiences to help kids learn and become enthusiastic learners using the proven HOMER method.

Responsibilities:
  • Developed the flagship HOMER Android app, a kid-focused learning platform utilizing ExoPlayer for video and internal JS game engines for interactive lessons.
  • Contributed to internal framework libraries for user management, lesson playing, and analytics, integrating with Amazon AppSync (GraphQL), AppsFlyer, and Embrace.
  • Improved code quality by introducing Android unit testing good practices, increasing coverage by 20%, creating tools to analyze and share coverage via Bitrise CI, and making it part of the mobile team culture.
  • Served as the Android tech reference, participating in business discussions, analyzing feasibility, proposing solutions, and leading cross-team initiatives.
  • Led the introduction of Jetpack Compose to the application, ensuring interoperability with existing code.
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Zup Innovation

September 2020 - June 2021, Campinas, SP, Brazil

Tech company, software consultancy and development center specialized in the banking industry, also being a creator of innovative OSS products focused on developer experience, software development and deployment.

Specialist Android Software Developer

May 2021 - June 2021

  • Led a quality-oriented initiative to split the repository into multiple modular repositories, making architectural decisions and building complex solutions from scratch, laying the groundwork for other squads.
  • Mentored fellow Android Developers and became an informal technical lead, frequently assisting in cross-squad initiatives and serving as a technical reference.
Senior Software Developer

September 2020 - April 2021

  • Developed a key feature for a mobile banking app for one of Brazil’s largest private banks, with 99.8% crash-free users, 4.8 stars on Google Play, over 10 million downloads, and 400k daily active users.
  • Actively participated in product discussions and business decisions, providing technical insights, analyzing feasibility, and proposing solutions to achieve team objectives.
  • Worked on internal SDKs and libraries, introducing features, fixing issues, and ensuring high-quality deliveries through code reviews and pair programming.
Software Developer
Dextra

July 2019 - August 2020, Campinas, SP, Brazil

Software consultancy and development center with a wide variety of national and international clients in several industries, being one of the pioneers in widely adopting Agile methodologies in Brazil.

Responsibilities:
  • Enhanced app features and resolved bugs and crashes in the sports app of Brazil’s largest TV network, utilizing GraphQL APIs, earning recognition for development and testing expertise.
  • Improved stability and architecture as lead developer on a redesign for a major currency exchange company’s app, successfully meeting a tight deadline in a fast-paced environment.
  • Shared technical knowledge through presentations to the Android Developers Guild and company-wide on Kotlin basics, Coroutines, Android testing, MockK, and Android Certifications.
  • Mentored interns in the 2020 Interns’ Challenge Project, teaching Dart, Flutter, and MobX, and guiding them in building a cross-platform app from scratch.
  • Mentored Junior and Mid-Level developers, focusing on technical skills, personal development, and career growth.
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Eldorado Research Institute

March 2016 - June 2019, Campinas, SP, Brazil

Non-profit research institute and software development center focused on energy, telecommunication and information technology industries with both national and international clients.

Software Engineer

September 2017 - June 2019

  • Worked as a Software Engineer for a global Android smartphone OEM, collaborating with distributed teams across the US, China, India, Europe, and Brazil.
  • Developed, reviewed, and maintained system Camera app code in Java, utilizing native libraries (C and C++) and an in-house framework based on finite state machines and OpenGL, later introducing Kotlin to the codebase and teaching other developers this new language.
  • Traveled to US headquarters for high-impact projects such as camera features for foldable devices and a 360º image capturing device, along with photo viewer, video player, and editor app.
  • Mentored Junior and Intern team members, providing technical guidance and teaching programming best practices through pair-programming and code reviews.
  • Won the Innovation award in an internal annual Hackathon with a self-conceptualized audio-related idea for automatic phone volume definition.
Junior Software Engineer

March 2016 - August 2017

  • Worked as a Software Engineer for a global Android smartphone OEM, collaborating with distributed teams across the US, China, India, Europe, and Brazil.
  • Worked on internal image sharing and camera tuning tools, enhancing system performance and stability across backend (Java), web frontend (JS), and Android app code.
Itaú Unibanco

October 2013 - March 2016, São Paulo, SP, Brazil

Largest private bank in Latin America, providing a range of services and products to the most varied client profiles with over 90,000 employees, nearly 5,000 full-service branches, 28,000 ATMs, and operating in 20 countries.

Junior Analyst

January 2015 - March 2016

  • Member of the ATM (Automated Teller Machine) operational team, focused on technical analysis of ATM hardware and software, specially troubleshooting issues, in the whole country.
  • Responsible for correlating and analysing ATM sensor data to select machines to undergo through preventive maintenance, avoiding future breakage and corrective maintenance.
  • Coordinated the preventive maintenance schedule and results, working closely with technical service providers, such as ATM manufacturers and certified repair companies.
  • Automated processes and developed software tools for the ATM operation help desk analysts using Microsoft Excel, Access, and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA).
Intern

October 2013 - December 2014

  • Gathered a deep technical understanding of ATM equipment, suggesting hardware and application improvements.
  • Automated processes and generated reports using Microsoft Excel, Access and VBA.
  • Responsible for analyzing equipment unavailability and breakage causes.
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Research Project Assistant
University of Rochester

May 2013 - August 2013, Rochester, NY, United States

One of the world’s leading research universities, located in Rochester, NY.

Responsibilities:
  • Worked in an academic setting, aiding MSc and PhD candidates in developing Project Bridge, a system for emotion detection and classification based on speech analysis and artificial intelligence.
  • Ported the BaNa Algorithm, a noise resilient audio pitch detection algorithm, from MatLab to Android, utilizing C and JNI to optimize performance, and Java for user interface and interaction.
  • Self-taught Java, Android, and C Development to meet project deadlines during a Summer experience, leveraging books, official documentation, and online resources.
  • Successfully developed an audio recording and processing app, with some degree of optimization both in the native C code with NEON intrinsics and in the Java app code with multithreading.