Hey, I'm Mathias! 👋
I’ve spent the last decade building things: startups, products, teams - and learning the hard way what works and what doesn’t.
Right now, I’m the CTO at Midlane, where we’re building tools for frontline teams. Before that, I co-founded Passbase, a digital identity company we grew from an idea to a global team—before successfully selling it.
My first love in tech was iOS development and Swift. I still remember the thrill of seeing my first app on the App Store. But as time went on, I got hooked on the web, the flexibility of JavaScript, and the infinite playground that is full-stack development.
Through all of this, I’ve learned one thing: building something from 0 to 1 is hard. The blogs and books rarely talk about the messy middle, when the code breaks, the team burns out, or when you ship too early and too late at the same time.
This newsletter is where I share what I’ve learned:
Candid lessons from building and selling startups
Engineering leadership stories (what I wish I knew when I started)
Practical advice for taking ideas from prototype to product
Why I write
I started this blog to share my experiences openly—the mistakes, the experiments, and the occasional wins—in the hope that it might help another founder, engineer, or builder on their journey.
What else I do
When I’m not building, I invest small angel checks into early-stage startups I believe in. Some of the incredible teams I’ve backed include Wemolo, Fides, Turnkey, Euclid, Rex, Synomym, Dashworks, or Popcorn.
Join me
If you’re building something, or want to, this newsletter is for you. Subscribe and join me on this journey of figuring things out, one post at a time.
