PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
– now
Freelance Data & Visualization Engineer
Self-directed data engineering and visualization work — large-scale cartography platforms, network mapping, and offline-first system prototyping
Basel, Switzerland
Self-directed data engineering and visualization work — large-scale cartography platforms, network mapping, and offline-first system prototyping
Basel, Switzerland
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Swisscom — DevOps Engineer
Maintained and modernized 28 mission-critical internal services used daily by field-operations teams; delivered features in Ruby on Rails within a SAFe Agile environment; deployed and operated with Docker & Kubernetes under strict SLAs; contributed to CI/CD improvements supporting frequent, low-risk releases
Zurich, Switzerland
Maintained and modernized 28 mission-critical internal services used daily by field-operations teams; delivered features in Ruby on Rails within a SAFe Agile environment; deployed and operated with Docker & Kubernetes under strict SLAs; contributed to CI/CD improvements supporting frequent, low-risk releases
Zurich, Switzerland
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EDGE Empower® — Senior Technical Lead
First in-house technical hire; built a modern offline PayTool replacing the legacy system, cutting processing time by 98%; parallelized the CI/CD pipeline, reducing build time from 14 to 4 minutes; contracted and coached 3 external developers and a UX designer
Zug, Switzerland
First in-house technical hire; built a modern offline PayTool replacing the legacy system, cutting processing time by 98%; parallelized the CI/CD pipeline, reducing build time from 14 to 4 minutes; contracted and coached 3 external developers and a UX designer
Zug, Switzerland
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ExtraPolo — Software Engineer & Consultant
Civic tech, data journalism, culture & arts, open source. 40+ projects across data investigations, web platforms, interactive installations and CMS systems. Selected clients: The Intercept Brasil (investigative data pipelines), Connectas / Grupo Bruto (ownership-network platform), and Rio de Janeiro's Environmental Secretariat (water-quality reporting platform)
Rio de Janeiro · Berlin · Athens · Lisbon
Civic tech, data journalism, culture & arts, open source. 40+ projects across data investigations, web platforms, interactive installations and CMS systems. Selected clients: The Intercept Brasil (investigative data pipelines), Connectas / Grupo Bruto (ownership-network platform), and Rio de Janeiro's Environmental Secretariat (water-quality reporting platform)
Rio de Janeiro · Berlin · Athens · Lisbon
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GFOSS.eu / Code + Create — Web Programming Teacher
Web programming to refugee and Greek youth through the Code + Create initiative (HTML, CSS, jQuery)
Athens, Greece
Web programming to refugee and Greek youth through the Code + Create initiative (HTML, CSS, jQuery)
Athens, Greece
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Tactical Tech Collective — Full-Stack Web Architect & Developer
Built tools and platforms under the Exposing the Invisible team
Berlin, Germany
Built tools and platforms under the Exposing the Invisible team
Berlin, Germany
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Trommsdorff + Drüner — Developer
For the innovation + marketing consultants team
Berlin, Germany
For the innovation + marketing consultants team
Berlin, Germany
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Meio — Co-founder
Coworking space shared with architects and designers
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Coworking space shared with architects and designers
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
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Cortex Intelligence — Developer
Competitive Intelligence and Data Mining R&D team
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Competitive Intelligence and Data Mining R&D team
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Logical Systems — SysAdmin & Java Developer
Maintained and developed its applications
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Maintained and developed its applications
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
INPP — Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Públicas — Developer
Main developer of the company "Planning" software in Delphi
Teresópolis, Brazil
Main developer of the company "Planning" software in Delphi
Teresópolis, Brazil
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MeuServidor — Co-founder
Web hosting server based on Linux & PHP
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Web hosting server based on Linux & PHP
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
SELECTED PROJECTS
40+ open-source projects across data analysis,
visualization, automation and AI tooling — including
helvetiscan, baseldosdados, swissviz and VISO. Browse the
interactive project graph at
extrapolo.com
| [github.com/rafapolo]
FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS
Moedax — Celo & Zcash Foundation Grants
Won competitive grants from the Celo and Zcash foundations to build a Web3 payments platform — authored smart contracts and bridged Web2/Web3 with a CBDC
Won competitive grants from the Celo and Zcash foundations to build a Web3 payments platform — authored smart contracts and bridged Web2/Web3 with a CBDC
WebDoc Graffiti Platform
Collaborative Cartographies Initiatives, by the Brazilian Federal Ministry of Culture | [website]
Collaborative Cartographies Initiatives, by the Brazilian Federal Ministry of Culture | [website]
Dammatio Memoriae | Software-Art
Gallery & book publication by Memefest: International Festival of Social Responsive Communication & Art | [website]
Gallery & book publication by Memefest: International Festival of Social Responsive Communication & Art | [website]
CAPES Fellowship for Postgraduate Research
By the Brazilian Federal Ministry of Education
By the Brazilian Federal Ministry of Education
EXHIBITIONS
Connecting Cities – Prototyping Lab
Awareness on the changes hardly visible to the eyes that underlie our cities. Transmediale, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin | [website]
Awareness on the changes hardly visible to the eyes that underlie our cities. Transmediale, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin | [website]
Pensar Público
Exhibition on dynamic and real-time city mapping. Centro Carioca de Design, Studio-X, Rio de Janeiro | [website]
Exhibition on dynamic and real-time city mapping. Centro Carioca de Design, Studio-X, Rio de Janeiro | [website]
Abotoados pela Manga
3-week art-and-politics residency during the 29º São Paulo Bienal of Art, São Paulo | [video]
3-week art-and-politics residency during the 29º São Paulo Bienal of Art, São Paulo | [video]
CERTIFICATIONS
Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (nFADP)
Databricks for Data Engineering
Gen AI Foundational Models for NLP
Generative AI & LLMs: Architecture & Data Prep
AI Agents using RAG & LangChain
TECH SKILLS
Python
Ruby on Rails
TypeScript
React
SQL
PostgreSQL
ETL & Data Engineering
REST API Design
Docker
Kubernetes
CI/CD
AWS
Linux
Git
AI Agents · RAG · LangChain
LLM Integrations
Crawling & Scraping
System Architecture · MVC · OOP
HTML · CSS · JavaScript
LANGUAGES
Portuguese native
English full professional
Spanish full professional
German B1 · telc
Greek A2
EDUCATION
Postgraduate in Data Science for Finance
NOVA IMS Information Management School
Lisbon, Portugal
NOVA IMS Information Management School
Lisbon, Portugal
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Master in Information Systems
Research Area: Knowledge Representation and Reasoning
Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (PPGI/UNIRIO)
Research Area: Knowledge Representation and Reasoning
Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (PPGI/UNIRIO)
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Bachelor in Computer Science
Centro Universitário Metodista Bennett
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Centro Universitário Metodista Bennett
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Extension in Digital Culture
Communication School (ECO/UFRJ)
Rio de Janeiro Federal University
Communication School (ECO/UFRJ)
Rio de Janeiro Federal University
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Java Software Development
Department of Electronic Computation (NCE/UFRJ)
Rio de Janeiro Federal University
Department of Electronic Computation (NCE/UFRJ)
Rio de Janeiro Federal University
Linux System Engineer
M.Cury Computação
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
M.Cury Computação
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil