Benjamin Marte: Fractional CTO & Forward Deployed Engineer

I work as your fractional CTO, or embed with your team as a forward deployed engineer and ship inside the stack you already run.

• Local, private AI. Open-weight models on your own hardware: sizing the machines, choosing and serving the models, and private assistants over your own documents and code, so nothing leaves the building.
• AI in your existing workflows. Coding agents like Claude Code, set up with agents, skills, hooks and MCP servers that reach your repos, CI and internal tools, and automations across the CRM, marketing and support systems you already use.
• Greenfield builds and R&D. New products from a blank page, and research and development at any stage of the lifecycle: discovery, UX and design, prototypes and proofs of concept, through to production.
• Developer experience. CI/CD pipelines, fast local environments and docs, so the team spends its time shipping.
• Fractional CTO. Architecture, build-or-buy and vendor decisions, and a roadmap for where AI pays off, without a full-time hire.

Remote with teams across the US, or on-site in Tampa Bay. Fractional retainers or fixed-scope projects, like a local AI setup or a single workflow integration.

Marketing websites, a SaaS web app, documentation and style guide sites, and the CI/CD pipelines and automations behind them, for companies like Rewst and Perch Security. Most ship with a CMS so the marketing team can manage the content themselves.

Notes on the tools and workflows I use: running LLMs locally, Claude Code agents, skills and MCP servers, Kubernetes, Docker and Hugo. I write things down so I don’t forget them.

A Bambu Lab X1 Carbon sits on top of the Kallax, next to Perchy and Stewart, the two bird mascots I designed, printed on it and airbrushed.

• 3D printer: Bambu Lab X1 Carbon
• Multi-colour: Bambu Lab AMS
• Mascots: Perchy (the green bird) and Stewart (the blue bird)

3D modeling and 3D printing are part of my skill set. Some of my designs are on Thingiverse.

I am a Tampa, Florida based fractional CTO and forward deployed engineer. I have been designing and building enterprise web applications since 1996: research and development projects, greenfield builds, and legacy software modernized to work with the hardware and software already in place. Now I focus on AI the practical way: private models on a company’s own hardware, and agents and automations wired into the tools its team already uses.

My career spans pharmaceutical CGMP validation, desktop publishing, marketing, motion graphics and web development.

The Kallax holds framed comics: Spider-Man, Venom, Spawn, Deadpool, Savage Dragon, the X-Men and the New Mutants. Beside it is the spider-web mural I designed and airbrushed, and Perchy and Stewart, the two bird mascots, keep watch from the top.

Everything in the lab hangs off one L-shaped standing desk: the monitors on top, the PC under the right wing, drawers under the left, and the chair where the long sessions happen.

• Desk: Autonomous DuoSpace, an L-shaped standing desk
• Keyboard: Logitech ERGO K860
• Chair: Autonomous ErgoChair Pro
• Storage: IKEA MICKE drawer unit under the left wing

The ultrawide is where this tour shows my blog posts: one curved screen as wide as two 4K monitors side by side. The Aorus beside it shows my projects.

• Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 57": curved, dual 4K (7680 × 2160)
• Gigabyte Aorus FO48U: 48" 4K OLED, 120 Hz, on the right wing

An ABS Gladiator tower under the right wing of the desk, with the consoles on the desk above it.

• CPU: Intel Core i9-10850K, 10 cores
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, 10 GB
• Memory: 128 GB DDR4
• Storage: 15 TB
• OS: Windows and Linux

An IKEA SKÅDIS pegboard with an LED backlight, over the window side of the desk.

• MacBook Pro, M5 Max with 128 GB: runs a range of open-weight models locally
• Camera: Nikon D5100 with 300 mm, 50 mm and 18–55 mm lenses
• Tools: Black & Decker drill, Neiko digital calipers, AstroAI multimeter

The second SKÅDIS pegboard, on the right-hand wall, holds the handhelds and controllers. The consoles sit on the desk below it.

• Handhelds: ASUS ROG Ally, Steam Deck
• VR: Meta Quest 2
• Consoles: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch
• Controllers: PlayStation 5 DualSense, Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch
• Mouse: Logitech G502 X
• Headset: Xbox headset

I airbrushed the spider-web mural on this wall myself.

Want private AI running on your own hardware, or AI working inside the workflows your team already has? I take fractional CTO retainers and fixed-scope projects, remote across the US or on-site in Tampa Bay. Tell me what you are working on using the form below.