I build fast, secure Laravel backends and APIs that hold up in production.
Mohammed Hamdy, Senior Backend Developer
- TA
- CA
- AW
- IT
9
Years building backends — at Taqeem, CAT, AWStreams, ITQAN.
Available for new projects · Cairo, Egypt
Senior Backend Developer with 9 years building PHP and Laravel systems for government, healthcare and real-time platforms.
I'm currently at the Saudi Authority for Accredited Valuers (Taqeem), building membership and valuation workflows on a platform that serves around 50K users and more than 2M valuation reports.
More about me- 9Years building backends
- 40+Projects shipped end-to-end
- 17K+Professionals using OZZ
- ~50KUsers on the platform I maintain
Where I've shipped backends that stay up under real traffic.
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Nov 2023 — Present Now
Taqeem
Senior Backend Developer
Saudi Authority for Accredited Valuers · Riyadh, KSA (Remote) All work here- Develop and maintain multiple Laravel platforms in Taqeem's ecosystem, which regulates the valuation profession in Saudi Arabia, serving ~50K users and 2M+ valuation reports.
- Built the Professional Certificate membership track for applicants without postgraduate degrees: rule-based eligibility, a multi-stage workflow (review, payment, approval), and automatic membership activation with access to the platform's courses.
- Designed the Fellowship membership tier with a 5-year renewal cycle and configurable eligibility rules, plus renewal gating that requires members inactive in their studies to complete a remedial course before renewing.
PHP / Laravel / MySQL / Caching / Queues / Database indexing
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Jan 2021 — Oct 2023
- Acted as lead backend developer across client projects: owned the backend end-to-end, broke down and assigned tasks, and coordinated with the tech lead, project manager, and clients for a squad of backend, frontend, QA, and UI/UX.
- Built NovoCare, an in-pharmacy live support system: customers use an in-store tablet to reach support agents via real-time chat, voice, or video (Twilio). Also built the agent-side support console and post-session customer ratings.
- Built the backend for VYA, a real-time auction platform: live bidding and chat with Laravel, Redis, and Socket.IO, an in-app wallet topped up with mada cards via EdfaPay, and shipping integration with OTO (KSA).
PHP / Laravel / MySQL / Redis / Socket.IO / Twilio / BigBlueButton / EdfaPay (mada) / OTO / GraphQL
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Nov 2018 — Jan 2021
- Designed and built secure RESTful APIs with JWT authentication for the OZZ mobile app, and deployed it on AWS using RDS and S3 for database and file storage.
- Developed Laravel platforms Dxpo (for companies) and Smrt.Cards (for individuals), and set up BigBlueButton for video conferencing features.
- Integrated Firebase Cloud Messaging for real-time push notifications across mobile apps.
PHP / Laravel / MySQL / JWT / AWS (RDS / S3) / BigBlueButton / Firebase Cloud Messaging
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Nov 2017 — Nov 2018
- Built 3 web applications with Laravel and Vue.js, including integration with the Google Books API.
PHP / Laravel / Vue.js / Google Books API / MySQL
APIs and platforms I built the backend for.
Taqeem membership & valuation platform
Membership tracks and valuation requests for the authority that regulates the valuation profession in Saudi Arabia.
- Problem
- Taqeem's ecosystem regulates who may practise valuation in Saudi Arabia, on a platform serving ~50K users and 2M+ valuation reports. New membership ro...
- My role
- Senior Backend Developer — I build and maintain the Laravel platforms behind membership and valuation: eligibility rules, multi-st...
PHP / Laravel / MySQL / Caching / Queues / Database indexing
Read case studyKomin
A smart power device and app that shows what every plugged-in appliance draws, switches it from anywhere, runs it on a schedule, and cuts the power when voltage or temperature goes wrong.
- Problem
- At home you can't see which appliance is drawing power, you can't switch things off once you've left, and voltage spikes and blackouts can damage devi...
- My role
- I built Komin as my own product, from the backend and app logic to the plans and launch on Google Play.
Laravel / PHP / REST API / Android / Google Play Billing / Windows hub / Wi-Fi smart plugs
Read case studyVYA — real-time auction platform
Live bidding and chat, an in-app wallet topped up with mada cards, and shipping handled from the same backend.
- Problem
- An auction only works if every bidder sees the same price at the same moment, and a buyer in KSA expects to pay with a mada card and have the item shi...
- My role
- Backend lead — I built the backend end-to-end: the real-time bidding layer, the wallet, and the shipping integration.
Laravel / Redis / Socket.IO / EdfaPay (mada) / OTO / MySQL
Read case studyNovoCare — in-pharmacy live support
An in-store tablet puts a customer in front of a support agent over chat, voice or video.
- Problem
- A customer standing in a pharmacy needs an answer there and then. The tablet in the store has to reach a real agent over chat, voice or video, and the...
- My role
- Backend lead — I built the support system on both sides: the in-store session and the agent console behind it.
Laravel / Twilio / MySQL
Read case studyBigBlueButton virtual classrooms
Self-hosted virtual-classroom servers for client platforms, extended with a custom live chat.
- Problem
- Client virtual-classroom platforms needed video conferencing they owned themselves rather than a third-party room, and the stock chat did not cover wh...
- My role
- Backend lead — I deployed and maintained the servers and built the chat layer on top of them.
BigBlueButton / Ubuntu / Nginx / SSL / JavaScript / Socket.IO
Read case studyCatalyst — internal management platform
One Laravel API serving both the web app and the mobile app, across sales, procurement and management.
- Problem
- Sales, procurement and management worked in separate flows, and the same data had to reach both a web client and a mobile client without two backends...
- My role
- Backend lead — I built the single API both clients run on.
Laravel / REST APIs / GraphQL / MySQL
Read case studyOZZ — digital business card
The API behind an NFC business card: one tap on a phone opens a profile that its owner can change at any time.
- Problem
- A card that is shared by tapping a phone only works if the profile behind it is always current and always reachable — the card itself holds nothing bu...
- My role
- Senior PHP Developer — I designed and built the REST API the mobile app runs on, and deployed it.
Laravel / JWT / AWS (RDS / S3) / MySQL
Read case studyTools I use every day — and the ones I reach for when it matters.
Backend & APIs
- PHP
- Laravel
- RESTful APIs
- GraphQL
- WebSockets (Socket.IO)
- JWT
- OAuth2
- Swagger / OpenAPI
Databases & caching
- MySQL
- PostgreSQL
- Redis
- Query optimization
- Indexing
Queues & async
- Laravel Queues
- Horizon
- Amazon SQS
- RabbitMQ
Integrations
- Twilio
- BigBlueButton
- FCM
- EdfaPay (mada)
- OTO
- Digital wallets
Cloud, testing & tools
- AWS (RDS, S3)
- DigitalOcean
- Linux (Ubuntu)
- Nginx
- GitHub Actions (CI/CD)
- Git
- PHPUnit
- Pest
- Postman
- Sentry
Also OOP · MVC · Agile / Scrum · Go (learning)
From the first call to the week after launch.
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/01
Discover
We go through goals, users and scope until the plan and the quote are clear.
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/02
Design
Data model, API contract and the structure you approve before I write the first endpoint.
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/03
Build
Weekly demos on a staging environment. You follow progress instead of waiting for promises.
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/04
Launch
Deploy, monitoring and documented APIs (Swagger/OpenAPI, Postman) your team can pick up.
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/05
Support
Fixes and new features after go-live — most of my work has been on systems already in production.
Questions I get asked before a project starts.
How does a project start?
Send a short brief through the contact form or by email. We agree on scope, timeline and price before any code is written.
Do you work remotely?
Yes. I'm based in Cairo and work remotely with the team at Taqeem in Riyadh, so remote delivery is the normal case for me, not an exception.
What kind of work do you take?
Laravel backends and REST/GraphQL APIs, real-time features (live bidding, chat, voice and video), payments and wallets, and performance work on systems that are already live.
Can you take over an existing codebase?
Yes. Most of my work has been on platforms that were already running: adding features and APIs, and fixing performance, without breaking what is live.
Which languages do you work in?
Arabic (native) and English (professional working proficiency).