# Brandon Penilla > SWE @ Mastercard | EECS New Graduate | UC Berkeley '24 | HSF Scholar | Regents and Chancellors Scholarship Finalist Location: Berkeley, California, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/brandonpenilla Hey! Brandon here, I’m a New grad from UC Berkeley EECS passionate about using technology to build stronger, more connected communities. With expertise in algorithms and data structures, database systems, computer architecture, artificial intelligence, and computer security, I love bringing together both technical and creative solutions that connect people and create memorable shared experiences. My work blends my technical skills with my enthusiasm for art, public speaking, and creative expression. From public speaking at events to leading team projects, I focus on communication, growth, and collaboration, ensuring every voice is heard and every challenge is met with innovation. Outside of the work environment, I'm an amateur boxer, revitalizing my art portfolio, and attempting my takeover in the pickleball scene. Always eager to connect with others! Feel free to reach out! brandon.pen@berkeley.edu ## Work Experience ### Software Engineer @ Mastercard Jan 2024 – Present | New York, United States API Gateway Engineer Experienced in NGINX API Gateway management, CI/CD automation, and cross-team Nginx Configuration validation scripting to ensure high-quality deployments and seamless API integrations. - Developed PR validation scripts for cross-team NGINX YAML configs, preventing invalid configuration inputs using dynamic regex checks, ensuring domain resolvability and region mapping while incorporating robust unit and integration tests to boost team accuracy and efficiency. - Used Jenkins to automate CI/CD pipelines, and configured NGINX to serve as our high-performance reverse proxy for API services, automating new domain onboarding and optimizing routing/security. - Created detailed documentation and onboarding processes for API gateway configurations, reducing errors and streamlining cross-team collaboration. ### Software Engineer - Contract @ Sourcegraph Jan 2024 – Jan 2024 Led a cross-functional of 6 engineers to develop a RoBERTa-based machine learning pipeline using Pytorch and Hugging Face Transformers, enhancing Cody, an AI assistant, and achieving a 10% increase in response accuracy. - Developed a comprehensive dataset by collecting documentation and issue pages from over 10,000 open-source repositories. - Utilized web scraping tools such as Beautiful Soup and Scrapy to gather and rank repository data relative to more than 150 queries with known ground truths. - Preprocessed and tokenized text data using RobertaTokenizer to prepare it for model training. - Trained and Optimized the RoBERTa model to rank and return the top k documentation/issues combinations that most accurately answer our queries. - Evaluated model performance by comparing outputs with ground truths, measuring response improvements using different context combinations. - Analyzed data to identify the most useful context sources, enhancing the model's ability to select relevant information and improving overall response accuracy. - Communicated complex technical concepts to technical and non-technical stakeholders, facilitating better decision-making across departments. ### Vice President External Affairs @ Codebase Jan 2023 – Jan 2023 | Berkeley, California, United States - Spearheaded club recruitment efforts in collaboration with other campus organizations, delivering presentations and outreach initiatives that engaged over 500+ students within two weeks. - Coordinated 10+ professional development and industry networking events, including company info-sessions, technical resume workshops, and tech talks, facilitating connections between 250+ students and industry leaders such as SpaceX and Activision Blizzard. - Managed and executed the annual Cub Fair, a tech-focused career fair featuring 10+ industry-leading companies, providing networking and career opportunities for over 500+ students. - Secured a partnership with DoorDash, offering exclusive discounts and resources to club members, resulting in over $200 in savings for students. ### Software Engineer @ Mastercard Jan 2023 – Jan 2023 | New York City Metropolitan Area • Optimized API Gateway performance using Unix sockets with IPC. • Implemented dynamic buffering for Nginx upstream server, reducing memory usage by 40% and client data transfer latency by 30%. ### Software Engineer @ Recidiviz Jan 2023 – Jan 2023 | San Francisco Bay Area • Developed an interactive web tool to predict average prison time served, promoting fairness in the justice system. • Parsed database and programmed business logic to calculate dynamic averages for specific cases. • Presented tool to courtroom officials in Missouri to influence truth-in-sentencing decisions. ### Research Scholar @ SRC Research Scholars Program Jan 2022 – Jan 2023 Selected and funded by Texas Instruments Incorporated ### Software Engineer @ San Francisco Conservatory of Music Jan 2022 – Jan 2023 | San Francisco Bay Area -Designed and incorporated employee Dashboard for different teams at SFCM. Including a facilities dashboard for attendance metrics, a Advancement dashboard for Donor and upcoming concert metrics, as well as a general summary dashboard using SQL, React.js and Express.js. - Incorporated SFCM database as well as SSO for employee login through Microsoft Azure leading them to their respective dashboards. ### Deep Dive Instructor for CS61B(Data Structures) @ UC Berkeley College of Engineering Jan 2022 – Jan 2022 | Berkeley, California, United States • Lead Bi-weekly deep dive sessions focussed on providing course support for Berkeleys introductory course on Data Structures. • Supported students by dedicating sessions to being extra tutoring office hours in order to ensure student success. ### Academic Intern for CS61B(Data Structures) @ UC Berkeley Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences (EECS) Jan 2022 – Jan 2022 | Berkeley, California, United States • Focussed on providing academic support for UC Berkeley's introductory Data Structures course with around 1600 students. • Worked alongside the TA's in order to support students with deep conceptual understanding of the course material as well as cleared up content misunderstandings. • Tasked with assisting with supporting students in debugging, understanding and running labs in Java ### Data Research Analyst @ Brightline Defense Jan 2022 – Jan 2022 | San Francisco Bay Area • We analyzed 2020 Clarity Node - S sensor air quality data with over 20,000 data inputs and plotted our pollutant effects as well as mitigations. • Analyzed the direct stationary sources responsible for the most pollution produced within the San Francisco Tenderloin and Market Street • After our analysis we created a visual presentation to be presented to the local community members in order for them to better understand the particulate matter within the area as well as wrote a 15 page literature review for a better understanding of the specific particulate, and their health impacts, as well as their mitigations to support the community. ### Co-Founder @ PrimeraVista Jan 2021 – Jan 2022 | Berkeley, California, United States Organized a summer program focussed on bridging the educational gap that underrepresented students in STEM suffer from. Currently in the works of becoming an official non-profit organization. • Developed a class structure and curriculum focussed on teaching introductory concepts in Python to underrepresented minorities hoping to dive into computer science. • Organized professional development workshops and provided the necessary resources to help students professionally. • Invited Industry Professionals as guest speakers for our students to get a chance to get their professional questions answered as well as receive further mentorship. ### Pre-Engineering Program(PREP) Calculus Instructor @ UC Berkeley College of Engineering Jan 2021 – Jan 2021 | Berkeley, California, United States • Facilitated 3-week Calculus Instruction in partnership with the Pre-Engineering Program at UC Berkeley. • Collaborated with 2 other current UC Berkeley Engineers to formalize a lesson plan to serve as an introduction to Berkeleys Math 1A course. • Held office hours and engaged with students providing guidance, mentorship, and academic support in order to ensure success. ### Campus Climate Administrator for Office of ASUC Senator Chaka Tellem @ Associated Students of the University of California Jan 2020 – Jan 2021 | Berkeley, California, United States • As a department we focussed on creating a space for underrepresented communities at UC Berkeley to feel supported and heard. • We accomplished this through the use of providing campus resources to others in need especially during the difficult online semesters as well as by facilitating events regarding retention and awareness. ### PREP Scholar @ UC Berkeley College of Engineering Jan 2020 – Jan 2020 | UC Berkeley • One of 110 Incoming Berkeley Engineering students selected to participate in the Program. • Designed and Prototyped a self-cleaning face mask in order to reduce the waste left by single-use masks during the COVID-19 pandemic. • Along with protection from Covid and waste reduction, our mask was designed with the purpose to collect hyper-local air quality data in order better map areas disproportionately affected by environmental racism. • Project Prototype was presented to Faculty, Alumni and Company representatives(Chevron, PG&E, Google, Boeing, GM) ## Education ### Bachelor of Science - BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science UC Berkeley College of Engineering ### High School Diploma Citrus Hill High school ### High School Diploma Perris High School ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/brandonpenilla - Portfolio: https://i-am-brandon.github.io/MyWebsite/ --- Source: https://flows.cv/brandonpenilla JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/brandonpenilla/resume.json Last updated: 2026-03-29