Hi, I’m Simone Potenza 👋
Building products and the teams behind them.
product engineer · technical leader · leading humans and AI agents
I’m a product engineer and technical leader. Currently I am Head of Engineering at Budget Thuis. I build products and help organizations scale their teams and their product thinking. I’ve co-founded and helped build startups, scaled and evolved complex distributed systems, and led, scaled, and transformed engineering organizations. Today I enjoy building tools that help people and companies be more productive. I do so with the help of AI.
My story
I’ve spent more than fifteen years in tech, and this is the short version of how I got here.
My story started at Konnektid, a startup I co-founded and led as CTO. It didn’t survive, but it taught me more about products, people, and resilience than any success could have, and it still shapes the way I lead today.
Then I joined HousingAnywhere as an engineer and grew with it for years, eventually becoming VP of Engineering . I led the team through 4× growth, from 20 to 70 engineers, modernizing legacy systems along the way. What I’m proudest of is building a place where engineers understood the impact of their work, and were able to autonomously create value.
After that, I decided to stay close to the craft, and I went back to hands-on work as Staff Engineer, at Road , rearchitecting the billing system powering their EV Charging Platform for scale. This is when I started to focus my energy on how AI can help engineers build better products faster. Something I’ve been exploring that ever since.
Along the way I’ve also loved building products hands-on with founders. At OneUp I led the team building MyTommy, the Tommy Hilfiger loyalty app for PVH. Outside of full-time roles I’ve partnered with founders to help build Bookabus and Salfio .
Today I’m Head of Engineering at Budget Thuis , leading the engineering teams through a technical transformation, to help them keep competitive in a challenging market for utility products and energy that reach millions of people.
What ties it together is impact, and how quickly I can create it. Sometimes that meant founding a company, sometimes leading an engineering organization, and sometimes going back to write the code myself.
Get in touch ☕
I am always happy to meet new people and know what they are busy with. Tell me what you’re working on. I read every email.
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New startup ideas
You have an idea and want a sparring partner to pressure-test it, shape the first version, or make the technical calls that are hard to undo.
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Adopting AI in engineering organizations
I am very interested to know more about how you or your engineering organization are adopting AI to build software. We can share ideas and brainstorm how to measure improvements.
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Preparing organizations for scale
Your team is growing fast and you want to know what systems, structure, and habits have worked or not for others at scale. I can share my experience, and I'd like to know your challenges.
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Billing and revenue management
This is my domain expertise! Managing revenue and getting insights from it is often overlooked early on, and a big problem when things start getting real. I'd like to know your story, and share insights.