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Giancarlo Erra
I am a Fractional CTO, AI strategist, builder, public speaker and professional musician.
I help businesses decide what to build, put AI to practical use and organise the people and systems behind it.
Short bio
I am a UK-based Fractional CTO, AI strategist and professional musician.
I help SMEs and creative-led businesses assess ideas, set technical direction and turn plans into working products and services. My work combines AI consultancy, product development, practical workshops and ongoing responsibility for systems businesses depend on.
I am Lead AI Consultant at Altaire. I also create products including SocratiCode and JanuScope.
Alongside technology, I record and perform with Nosound and as a solo artist. My speaking and teaching draw on both technical and creative practice.
About me
I started programming on an Amiga 500 at 14 and recording music at 16. Both have stayed part of my working life.
I like taking an idea through the decisions, experiments and practical work needed to make something people can use. That might be a software product, a business system or a record.
Working across technology and music means moving between the details and the bigger picture: how something works, what it is for and how people experience it.
AI makes it easier to produce work quickly. Deciding what is useful, checking the result and taking responsibility for it still matter.
Originally from Rome, I have been based in the UK since 2009. Consulting, teaching and performing all keep working with people central to what I do.
Read tech or creative for more details about my tech and creative careers, or skills for an overview of my skills and experience.
Tech career
My work combines technical direction, AI consultancy and building products. I help businesses work out what they need, choose an approach and organise its delivery.
As Lead AI Consultant at Altaire, I work on AI adoption and integration, and have trained thousands of professionals through practical workshops.
My career began in web development, databases and Linux systems, with work across internet hosting, online education and organisations including WWF Italy. After moving to the UK in 2009, I took on product ownership and technical direction, including long-running e-commerce systems.
My own products include SocratiCode and JanuScope for AI developers, and APD for astrophotography planning. I also built Tweetify It, which reached 8K+ users without a marketing budget.
I co-founded the AI Summit in Norwich and speak about AI and software development. Earlier projects span Linux tools, mobile apps and music technology, including iLinkPod, which reached one million downloads.
Creative career
I compose, produce and perform music with Nosound and as a solo artist, alongside my technology work.
I started recording at 16, learning sound engineering, production and several instruments. I released my first album independently, handling its online promotion and distribution, before signing a record deal.
With Nosound, that developed into international releases and touring as guitarist and lead singer. Across my music career, I have sold 60K+ physical copies worldwide. The work extends from writing and recording to artwork, release campaigns and live performance.
In 2019 I began releasing solo work focused on electronic music and soundtracks, with multimedia performances combining sound and visuals.
Photography, video and design are also part of my creative practice. You can find the music and other work in links.
Skills
Leadership and Management:
- Fractional CTO and technical principal
- Creative product ownership
- Hands-on product management
- Technical direction
- Project management
- Start-up business development
- Team leadership and engineering practice
Technical:
- Generative AI platforms (foundational and open LLMs, RAG, MCP etc.)
- Full-stack web development (PHP, Laravel, Flutter, JS, Tailwind)
- Database (SQL) development and administration (MySQL, PostgreSQL)
- Machine Learning and neural networks (Python)
- System administration (Linux) and cloud (AWS)
- Prototyping and MVP development
- E-Commerce systems engineering
- Web and graphic design
Communication:
- Public speaking and mentoring
- Investors and stakeholder relations
- Clients and media relationship management
- Practical AI education and community building
Creative Production:
- Music and audio production (Logic, Pro Tools, Ableton)
- Photo and visual production (Adobe Suite, Final Cut Pro)
- Photography and videography (manual, gimbal, drone)
Links
Selected companies, products and creative work, with a little about my contribution to each.
- SocratiCode
- I build and maintain this open-source codebase intelligence tool for AI coding agents. It has 3,335 GitHub stars and 430 forks as of 13 October 2026.
- JanuScope
- I created this local policy layer for AI tools: control permitted calls, redact matching response data and keep an audit trail.
- APD
- My astrophotography planner brings weather forecasts, sky surveys and camera framing together. The website includes screenshots and installation guides.
- Altaire Limited
- I lead AI consultancy and practical workshops, helping businesses assess uses for AI, plan its introduction and develop their own working examples.
- Tweetify It
- I built this AI product for personalised social posts. It reached 8K+ users without a marketing budget and ranked #4 for Product of the Day on Product Hunt.
- Audioshapes AI
- My sound-design project using neural networks to learn from synthesiser preset libraries and generate new sounds.
- Widescreen Studio Limited
- The production and web consultancy company I founded, bringing together music, multimedia and web work.
- Giancarlo Erra .COM
- My solo recordings and multimedia performances, focused on electronic music and soundtracks.
- Nosound
- The band I founded and lead as songwriter, guitarist and singer, with international releases and touring.
- Astro Observer
- My astrophotography gallery and prints, with astronomy writing and an interactive Solar System model.
- Degauss
- I build and maintain this visual game browser for MiSTer FPGA, with support for CRT and HDMI displays, regular releases and community support.
Contact
- [email protected]
- Drop me an email
- Connect with me on LinkedIn
Curriculum vitae
Get in touch about AI strategy, fractional CTO and advisory work, or the technical direction of a new product.
This website is an introduction to my work. My CV provides more detail on responsibilities, projects and career history.
You can email me (or connect on LinkedIn) to request a copy of my CV.
Why not a normal website?
One of my pet peeves is how most websites nowadays look the same, to the point of not being able to tell them apart if not for the logo and the colour scheme (if they don't use the same purple everyone is using!).
They are designed to be user-friendly via familiarity, but for me innovation is in wanting to be different, bold, emerge from the crowd and set new trends, taking the risk of being different as a challenge.
When the internet first arrived in my country, it all started with BBS and chat rooms like IRC. It was all working via terminal.
I still remember the excitement, the sense of awe and power when I logged into a server via terminal for the first time.
And nowadays, we're going back in full circle with people getting used again to text interaction with AI chatbots.
It seemed only natural to me to create a website that works via a terminal: not only it's different and an homage to the past, but it also forces the visitor into an active interaction, creating a more memorable and lasting engagement.
Hopefully making someone remember the past with nostalgia, and someone else curious about how things were working in the past :-)