# Andrew Forster > Experienced Full Stack Software Engineer | C#/.NET/.NET Core | WPF/WinUI3 | C++ l Engineering Leader Location: San Jose, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/andrewforster Accomplished Software Engineer and Engineering Leader with over 20 years of experience in building commercial and enterprise applications that have positively impacted millions of users. Renowned for a hands-on leadership style that champions best practices in software architecture, security, and user-centric design. Demonstrated success in collaborating with cross-functional teams to deliver innovative and market-leading applications and platforms. ## Work Experience ### Staff Software Engineer @ Verizon Jan 2021 – Present | San Jose, California, United States Served as a pivotal leader and product owner, significantly influencing the evolution of the company's flagship Windows desktop video conferencing application. Focused on enhancing performance, usability, security, and facilitating growth into new markets. Championed cross-team collaboration, fostering a culture of innovation and efficiency that accelerated product development cycles and reduced time to market. Facilitated collaboration among a global engineering team of 15, directly leading a squad of 6, driving project milestones and executing the shared roadmap, while effectively navigating the challenges of a distributed team. Led a pivotal overhaul of the application to incorporate the latest technologies, achieving a 50% boost in performance and improved UI responsiveness, while positioning the platform for quicker adaptability and future integrations. Significantly increased team velocity and sharpened developer focus by adopting new development practices (e.g., mono-repository, trunk-based development, pair-programming). Refined or removed other processes that were not providing value or improving project cohesion.. Directly contributed to product development using C++, C#, .NET, XAML, and WinUI3, driving key enhancements that improved application robustness and user experience. Expanded the application's market reach by adding support for native ARM64 devices enabling entry into telehealth kiosks, tablets, and extended battery life laptops. Nurtured creativity and fostered a sense of ownership among engineers by leading hack-a-thons and moderating discussion forums. Encouraged engagement through active mentorship and by exemplifying the innovation process from concept to completion, culminating in the adoption of several ideas as product enhancements. ### Senior Software Engineer @ BlueJeans by Verizon Jan 2016 – Jan 2021 | San Jose Led the native development for the company’s flagship video conferencing application. Built the application framework, React Native bootstrap infrastructure, and React Native modules for one of the first React Native Windows applications. Developed the Windows Media Application SDK, integrating the low-level media stack and back-end video services with the application's React Native business logic layer, using a combination of C++, C#, .NET, DirectX, WPF, and JavaScript. This integration provided full support for all video conferencing services and the rendering of up to 49 simultaneous videos in the React Native presentation layer. Added support for virtualizing audio and video when running the video conferencing application in a Virtual Desktop Interface (VDI) environment such as Citrix and VMWare resulting in an optimized user experience. Designed and implemented .NET / WPF user interfaces to enhance the user experience. Integrated with Windows Core Audio APIs allowing for full control and monitoring of the operating system audio system. Worked closely with penetration testing vendors to focus on application security and user privacy. Improved protections of data at rest, prevented protocol spoofing, ensured rigorous data validation, and enhanced compliance with GDPR and other privacy regulations. Managed a private fork of the React Native Windows repository, deployed internal enhancements with NPM, and contributed back to the upstream repository. Worked directly with Microsoft to port React Native Windows to WPF allowing desktop applications to be written using React Native. ### Senior Software Engineer (Collaboration) @ Cisco Jan 2011 – Jan 2016 | San Jose, CA Lead developer on all the Windows based Push-To-Talk communication and radio dispatch applications. The "Instant Connect" platform allowed virtually any set of devices to communicate with each other in real time across different protocols. These devices included police and fire radios, mobile phones, landlines, and VOIP. The platform included a central dispatching management application capable of coordinating 50+ communication channels and several end-user applications and SDKs. My responsibilities included designing and developing many of the components and features of the application stack. These included the media engine developed in C++ and the user interface and line of business layers, which were developed in C#/.NET/WPF. ### Software Engineer (Unified Communications) @ Cisco Jan 2005 – Jan 2011 | San Jose, California Participated in the development of multiple unified communication and collaboration applications for the Windows platform. These applications combined support for audio & video calling, instant messaging, presence, and integration with the WebEx meeting platform. My responsibilities included developing the user interface, business logic, and software development kit (SDKs). During my tenure I became the product lead overseeing a geographically distributed and diverse team. ### Member of Technical Staff @ Various Companies Jan 2000 – Jan 2005 | San Jose, California, United States Developed software for secure access, storage encryption, and secure communications using industry standards. Built Windows agent software for the United States Postal Service's Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). ### Windows Software Engineer (Enterprise Client Software) @ America Online Jan 2003 – Jan 2005 | Mountain View, California Participated in the development of a Windows based enterprise-level application suite that included instant messaging, contact management, email, and audio streaming components. My responsibilities included developing the user interface for the standalone contact management application, integrating contact management related functionality into the suites' other applications, and developing the external contact management SDK. ## Education ### Bachelor of Science - BS in Computer Science San José State University ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/anforste --- Source: https://flows.cv/andrewforster JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/andrewforster/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-12