What if you built less platform and got more done?

Описание: Platform engineering doesn’t have to mean building heavy abstractions or chasing internal NPS scores. In fast-moving domains like online car retail and restaurant tech, I’ve led architecture modernisation efforts through light-touch platforms that enable fast flow - not just enforce it. This meant defining sensible defaults, aligning teams around a focused golden path (serverless, event-driven, TypeScript), and using platform thinking to guide - not dictate - technical decisions.

This talk shares how we modernised legacy systems while supporting real business outcomes - from enabling the sale of thousands of cars at scale, to powering ordering platforms for thousands of independent restaurants. You’ll hear how we handled standardisation without rigidity, used golden paths to accelerate rather than constrain, and evolved internal platforms that stayed out of the way when needed.

Expect practical stories of what we paved, what we left open, and how platform teams can unlock speed without centralising control.

Speaker: Toli Apostolidis
Flipdish, Lead Architect

Toli is a Software Engineering Practitioner who believes that learning and working together are catalysts for high-performing software-first teams who care about how their software serves their customers.

Toli's career began in the field of maths and physics, which led him into the world of software engineering, where he spent his formative first few years learning the craft while writing algorithms for solving large-scale "travelling-sales-person" problems across the globe. He has since worked with Brent from The Phoenix Project for a B2B energy company, the initial core team at cinch to build the fastest-growing unicorn in UK startup history, while he is currently helping Flipdish build the next generation of restaurant tech.

Throughout this journey, Toli fell in love with DevOps, Observability and Team Topologies, while he discovered a new passion for serverless, event-driven socio-technical architectural paradigms and product thinking.