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Often pleased. Never satisfied.

Fractional CTO for founder-led service businesses

I'm Rob Weidner, a Fractional CTO based in Austin, Texas. Technology decisions need an owner. I join your leadership team part-time to set direction, coordinate your builders and vendors, and connect the work to a measurable business result.

See the Fractional CTO engagement.

Often pleased. Never satisfied.

I've always been wired to find a better way. Not for the sake of change, but because every system has room to improve.

Sometimes that better way is AI. Sometimes it's a cleaner process, a sharper build-versus-buy call, or a tool that already exists. I don't lead with the technology. I lead with the problem, then take ownership of the technology decisions that make the fix stick.

What I do now

I am a Fractional CTO, a part-time, fully embedded technology leader for founder-led service businesses. I own technology direction for one agreed initiative, working with your team and implementation partners to deliver it.

One profit-linked initiative at a time. Weekly executive direction. Async between sessions. Your builders still build; I own stack direction, vendors, AI boundaries, adoption, and measurement.

I also take select Technical Advisor seats when a company needs sharp judgment without a full fractional CTO engagement.

The through line

My career started behind the camera — multi-camera arrays for helicopters, drones on films like Black Panther and Tomb Raider. On a film set, when everything clicks, the crew finds its rhythm and the shot comes together. That feeling is what I now help companies build in their operating systems.

One exit (StreamVT), four companies, and a decade of taking ideas from zero to one. Most days I'm with founder-led and high-growth teams across ~20 clients and 300+ stakeholders, including Fortune 100 work in tech, automotive, and energy.

How I work

Uncomfortable questions first. Challenge what's actually broken before touching a tool. Then prototype fast with real data and real constraints. That's usually where skepticism turns into momentum.

Background

South Africa for 7 years, time in the Middle East, based in Austin, TX. Consulting and technology work with a Fortune 100 technology company, a Fortune 100 automaker, two large energy utilities, two of the world's largest philanthropic foundations, and founder-led operators like Indoor Drone Tours (some through agency partners Claribase, Optimize, and Pretty Simple), and production work with Disney, Marvel, Apple TV+, Rivian, and Porsche.

Ventures: Film Gear South Africa, Kelvin Corner, StreamVT (exited), ShowCal (building).

From film sets to your stack

Building my own companies taught me how to read a business fast: spot what's broken, prototype a fix, iterate at a pace the business can absorb. Same instinct I brought from film sets into the CTO seat.

If you need someone to own the technology side of a profit problem — Fractional CTO or Technical Advisor.

Learn more

Apply for Fractional CTO

Not ready for a full seat? Technical Advisor