Engineering Leader · EV & Energy · AI
VinayakShivapuje
Director of Engineering at Ford Motor Company. Over a decade of building — taking Electriphi from startup through its acquisition by Ford, growing the org from 20 to 80+ engineers, shipping charging platforms at enterprise scale, and now leading Ford's enterprise AI initiatives in that space.
Bengaluru, India · 12.97° N, 77.59° E
Operating
Principles
Ten years building and leading engineering teams, from a bootstrapped logistics startup to a 60-engineer org inside Ford Motor Company. The through-line has always been the same measure of success:
“Impact is the ultimate measure of success.”
Impact over activity
Shipping code is not the goal. Solving a real problem and moving a real number is.
Scale people before systems
Teams that hire and coach well outlast any single architecture decision. Electriphi went from 20 to 80+ engineers without losing its culture.
Own the outcome, not just the task
Ownership means caring about what happens after the deploy — reliability, cost, and the customer on the other end.
Simplicity is the sophisticated choice
Complex problems rarely need complex solutions. Build systems a new engineer can understand on day one.
The Path
Ford Motor Company
Subsidiary → Enterprise TechnologyDirector of Engineering — Charging, Enterprise Technology
- Leading a 60-engineer org shipping EV charging strategy with an AI-driven focus
- Driving AI integration into products, tools, and processes across the team
EV Charging · GCP · PostgreSQL · OCPP · OpenADR · AI/ML
Electriphi — Ford Pro
Grew 20 → 80+ engineersDirector of Engineering
- Scaled the engineering org from 20 to 80+ engineers at peak as a fully owned Ford subsidiary
- Delivered 20+ features while scaling the platform to tens of millions of charging transactions
- Led enterprise hardening across reliability, security, and regulatory compliance
Angular · React · Go · Python · MongoDB · PostgreSQL
Electriphi
Acquired by Ford Motor CompanyDirector of Engineering
- Built a 20-person team — dev, QA, DevOps, support, PM — in roughly six months
- Laid the engineering groundwork for enterprise readiness that supported the Ford acquisition
Angular · React · Go · Python · MongoDB · PostgreSQL
Independent
Technology Consultant
- Advised early-stage teams on product direction and engineering discipline
Appiness Interactive
Senior Software Engineer → Technical Lead
- Stabilized Electriphi’s early product and introduced engineering standards
- Led hiring, coaching, and culture across 40+ engineers over 8+ client engagements
Angular · React · Node.js · MySQL · PostgreSQL · AWS
Pickdro
Founder-led, bootstrappedCo-Founder & Head of Product/Engineering
- Bootstrapped a last-mile logistics startup to ~35 B2B clients with zero external funding
- Owned tech, operations, and hiring; shipped 4 apps serving ~6,000 customers at 4.8/5
Dayananda Sagar College of Engineering
B.E., Computer Science & Engineering
- Built campus placement, event management, and college data systems
Capabilities
Leadership & Strategy
Team Building & Scaling, Hiring & Coaching, M&A Integration, Cross-functional Delivery, Product Strategy
Technical Architecture
System Design, Microservices, Cloud-native Applications, API Design, Distributed Systems
Cloud & Infrastructure
GCP, AWS, Kubernetes, Docker, Terraform, CI/CD
EV & Energy Domain
EV Charging (CPO/Fleet), OCPP / OpenADR, Energy Tariffs & Demand, Fleet Operations, TCO & Cost Models
Languages
TypeScript / JavaScript, Python, Go, Node.js, SQL
Data & Storage
PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Redis, Time-series Data, Data Pipelines
Strategic Impact
Ford acquisition
Key technical architect in the acquisition of Electriphi by Ford Motor Company, then led the integration into Ford Pro.
Enterprise-scale EV charging
Architected a platform handling tens of millions of charging transactions, hardened for reliability, security, and compliance.
Let's talk
Happy to talk EV charging, engineering leadership, or scaling teams through an acquisition. I'm not looking for new roles, but always glad to compare notes.
Get in touch