Waterloo, Ontario

Technical consulting for founders who build things.

When your CTO quits three weeks before launch. When the architecture decision could cost you six months of rework. When you need someone who can debug a protocol stack and discuss product strategy in the same conversation. I'm not a management consultant. I'm a builder who consults — 25 years of shipping real products, $0 in VC.

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What I Do

I'm most useful when the problem is ambiguous, cross-disciplinary, or stuck.

Most technical problems fit a specialist. The ones that land on my desk don't. They sit between domains — where the radio engineer says "talk to the AI team" and the AI team says "talk to the product people." I work across all three. If that sounds like the kind of problem you're facing, this might be for you.

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AI Strategy & Agentic Workflows

Designing AI agentic workflows, voice agents, and LLM-powered internal tools that create real leverage — not demos, not slide decks.

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Embedded Systems & Protocols

Drawing on my background in cellular protocols (EDGE/LTE) to design and debug IoT radio stacks. If it involves bits on a wire, I've probably worked on something like it.

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Software Architecture

Making the right calls on architecture and infrastructure. The decisions that compound — for better or worse — over years, not sprints.

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SaaS Product Strategy

Helping founders figure out what to build, how to position it, and how to get it in front of the right customers. Strategy that comes from having done it yourself.

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Technical Due Diligence

Deep technical evaluation for investors and acquirers. I read the code, not just the pitch deck. You get an honest answer, not a rubber stamp.

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System Rescue & Cost Reduction

Rescuing over-complicated or vibe-coded systems. Reducing costs and bloat without rewriting from scratch. Sometimes the fix is smaller than anyone thought.

How I Work

A conversation, not a sales pitch.

You Reach Out

Send me a message about what's broken or what you're trying to build. I reply within 24 hours.

We Talk

A 30-minute call. No pitch, no pressure. You describe the problem. I'll tell you honestly if I can help — and if I can't, I'll point you to someone who can.

I Diagnose

If it's a fit, I do a lightweight diagnostic — code review, architecture assessment, or strategy session. You get concrete findings before any major commitment.

I Deliver

Concrete output: a roadmap, a prototype, an audit report, or direct implementation. No surprises. No bills for "strategy alignment sessions."

Case Studies

Real products I built and ran. Not things I advised on.

SaaS • UML

WebSequenceDiagrams

One of the web's most widely used sequence diagram tools. Converts plain text into professional UML diagrams.

$10K+ MRR on a $5 VPS

Single Go binary + SQLite. No microservices. No Kubernetes. Twelve years running.

SaaS • Collaboration

Zwibbler

Collaborative whiteboarding and diagramming canvas. Used for wireframes, mind maps, and quick sketches.

Serves thousands of students nationwide

Built on a minimalist stack. Canvas performance, not trendy infrastructure.

AI • Fintech

eh-trade.ca

AI-powered financial analysis for Canadian investors. Deep research on 11,000+ stocks.

4× RTX 3090s, $0 cloud AI costs

Local GPU cluster instead of cloud APIs. Custom Ralph Loop architecture built because the cloud bill would have been prohibitive.

NLP • Multilingual

RhymeBrain

One of the largest rhyming dictionaries on the web. Multilingual NLP engine.

5 languages, one lean pipeline

Custom phonetic analysis, stress detection, rhyme scoring — no expensive third-party APIs.

Insights & Frameworks

Lessons from 25 years of building real products — no email required, no pitch at the end.

Architecture

How I Run Multiple $10K MRR Companies on a $20/Month Stack

Single binaries, SQLite, and zero cloud vendor lock-in. The real cost of modern infrastructure isn't the bill — it's the complexity you take on.

Read on my blog →

AI Strategy

A Ralph Loop for Reading: Beating GPT with a 4K Context Window and 4 GPUs

Deep financial research on 11,000 stocks. Local GPUs instead of cloud APIs. The architecture that made it work when the obvious approach was too expensive.

Read on my blog →

Leadership

I Learned Mandarin. Here's What It Taught Me About B2C SaaS.

The learning curve for language and the learning curve for building products are the same shape. What the early wins teach you — and what they don't.

Read on my blog →

What Clients Say

"I needed someone with a sharp perspective on how to think about some of the architecture and critical components of my voice AI technology stack. Steve Hanov gives me that assurance. I'm lucky to have met him at Builders Club, now I have a heavy hitter in my corner when I need to make critical business decisions about complex engineering problems that are way out of my league."

— Ian Timotheos-Pilon, Voice AI Founder

About

I've worked across the whole stack for 25 years — from radio protocols to SaaS products. I was an indie founder for 16 of them.

The arc

I led EDGE/LTE firmware work at BlackBerry, built cellular protocol stacks, worked in the Office of the CTO, and filed five patents. Before that, I worked at Microsoft on IPv4/IPv6 networking. Then I spent 16 years as an indie founder, building and running profitable SaaS products without venture funding — WebSequenceDiagrams, Zwibbler, RhymeBrain, and eh-trade.ca.

Today I consult with companies and founders on AI strategy, embedded systems, software architecture, SaaS product strategy, technical due diligence, GTM, and rescuing over-complicated systems. I know what it feels like to be the person making the call — because I've been that person.

M.Math Computer Science, UW

Ex-BlackBerry (Office of the CTO)

Ex-Microsoft (IPv4/IPv6)

5 Patents (EDGE/LTE)

3D printing enthusiast

Mandarin speaker

200+ technical blog posts

11.5k Stack Overflow rep

Blog → | LinkedIn → | GitHub →

Let's Talk

If you need someone who can go from low-level technical details to product strategy in the same conversation — and tell you honestly what's what — send me a message.

What happens next

You send me a message. I reply within 24 hours — usually faster. We schedule a 30-minute call. No pitch, no pressure. You describe the problem. I'll tell you honestly whether I can help.

If it's not a fit, I'll point you to someone who might be. If it is, I'll outline a concrete next step — usually a lightweight diagnostic before any major commitment. You stay in control the whole way.

Email: steve.hanov@gmail.com

Location: Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

Remote: Yes — I work with teams worldwide

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