about
This is my personal site — a place to share things I'm building and experimenting with outside of work. Mostly software, mostly for the interest of it.
gse-create is where I put side projects and personal experiments. Right now that means a note-taking app for Android and an exploration into self-hosted infrastructure — but it'll grow as I find new things worth building. Have a look at the projects page to see what's here.
My name is Stephen Cowx. By day I work as a business architect — I've spent over 20 years in software and systems delivery, moving from writing code early in my career through to leading architecture on large enterprise programmes.
I care about systems that are well-designed, honestly scoped, and actually delivered. I'm based in Surrey, UK.
Business Architect
Helping to develop the capability for rapid software and systems delivery to accelerate business building.
Lead Architect
Lead architect for a mobile-first marketing platform built on augmented reality, geolocation, and interactive gameplay. Responsible for system design and overseeing delivery from inception to production.
Enterprise Architect
Providing strategic architecture support to the Environments & Data team.
Enterprise Architect — Covid Pass
Led the architecture capability and supported senior leaders on the UK Covid Pass Programme. Drove technical teams towards a leaner, more manageable, more cost-effective system.
Lead Infrastructure Architect
Lead architect on a small team that designed and oversaw the full IT infrastructure for the greenfield laboratory site — server rooms, cabling, power, network, 550+ end-user devices, and active security. Hybrid cloud design using Azure, Intune, AAD, and ExpressRoute with multi-redundancy.
Lead Architect — Future Borders
Lead architect on a cross-government border-systems improvement programme, bringing together multiple departments and suppliers across a complex landscape of border systems.
Technical Architect
Technical architect for delivery pipeline, platform, and DevOps for Home Office Biometrics.
Development Team Lead & Application Architect
Various senior positions on large-scale enterprise application projects — team leadership, application architecture, build systems, development, and innovation.
Senior Developer
Senior developer on Project Kangaroo — an internet-based broadcasting platform for Channel 4, ITV, and the BBC.
End-to-end solution and enterprise architecture. System design, team setup, secure environments, cloud and hybrid platforms.
Full life cycle development of distributed enterprise applications. Bespoke software, web services, API and COTS integration.
Infrastructure as code on AWS and Azure. Configuration management, DevOps pipelines, and cloud-native design.
Building mobile apps and digital products — currently the focus of gse-create.