Chris Mcdowell
Principal Software Engineer at Virgin Red
London, England, United Kingdom
Summary
👤
Senior🎓
Top SchoolChris Mcdowell is a Principal Software Engineer based in London with 13 years of experience building high-volume backend services using Java and Python. He has progressed from internship to principal-level technical leadership at consumer-facing companies like Expedia, Lyst and Virgin Red, focusing on scalable systems and delivery excellence. Chris blends hands-on implementation (CI/CD tooling, backend services, and occasional frontend modernization) with team coaching and technical ownership. He has a track record of improving release pipelines and pragmatic automation—evident since an early internship where he delivered a Ruby gem and CI tooling—and continues to drive platform improvements at Virgin Red. Comfortable in both startup-paced and large-enterprise environments, he balances product needs with robust engineering practices. Trained in computer science at Loughborough University, he brings a practical, systems-first approach to complex web architectures.
13 years of coding experience
7 years of employment as a software developer
Bachelor's degree Computer Science, Bachelor's degree Computer Science at Loughborough University
Github Skills (8)
yahoo-weather-api8
weather-api4
api3
python3
yahoo3
thor1
command-line-tool1
cli1
Github contributions (5)
cmcdowell/match-thread-bot
Nov 2012 - Feb 2013
Contributions:66 commits in 3 months
cmcdowell/weatherpy
Feb 2013 - Dec 2013
Contributions:10 commits in 9 months
weather-apiapipythonyahoo-weather-apiapi-wrapper
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