Cemal Eker

Senior mobile engineer with 15+ years of experience (iOS since 2010), specializing in camera, media capture, and computer-vision experiences — live streaming, audio playback engines, and augmented reality. Freiberufler in Berlin, taking contract engagements across DACH now (remote or on-site); open to full-time for the right team. Two leadership stints; comfortable owning delivery end to end. German at B1 and improving.

Experience

1. Independent iOS Engineer · Self-employed

   Mar 2024 – present · Berlin

   • Deliberate sabbatical after ~17 years of shipping; advanced my German to B1 and settled in Berlin long-term.
   • Now taking contract engagements — camera, capture, playback, and AR/CV work on iOS, remote or on-site across DACH.

2. Mobile Developer · Scandit

   Apr 2022 – Mar 2024 · Remote (Berlin)

   • Integrated and maintained Scandit’s computer-vision SDK across mobile platforms and WebAssembly.
   • Built a SwiftUI augmented-reality shelf-scanning solution from scratch.
   • Contributed to the SDK core, primarily in C/C++.

3. iOS Team Lead · IDAGIO

   Oct 2020 – Apr 2022 · Berlin

   • Took over the iOS lead after an acquisition and layoffs reshaped the team (~2 developers); ~70% implementation, 30% management.
   • Simplified team processes; owned mentoring, onboarding, code quality, delivery, and CI/CD.

4. iOS Developer · IDAGIO

   Apr 2018 – Sep 2020 · Berlin

   • Built user-facing features and rebuilt UI in a 4-developer team.
   • Owned the player SDK: implemented gapless, lossless playback to classical-listening standards on an Objective-C playback library.
   • Improved buffering, decoupled the SDK from the app, added Swift unit tests, improved CI.

5. iOS Developer · Freelance / personal projects

   Mid 2016 – Early 2018 · Istanbul

   • Independent client and personal work before relocating to Berlin.

6. iOS Developer / Tech Lead · Volt

   Jan 2016 – Jul 2016 · Istanbul

   • Replaced a polling REST/Django flow with a real-time ride-matching system using Firebase as a client-facing view layer.
   • Cut average ride-match time from minutes to under 5 seconds.
   • Mentored backend and Android developers through the integration.

7. iOS Developer · Hipo

   Jun 2012 – Apr 2015 · Istanbul (remote for Toronto)

   • Built multiple consumer iOS apps from scratch in Objective-C/UIKit — including blogTO, FoodTruckTO, Moment, and introduce.social — for Hipo’s clients.
   • API integration, release-cycle management, design reviews, and stakeholder feedback.

8. Full Stack Developer / Team Lead · OpenAgenda

   Sep 2011 – Mar 2012 · Remote

   • Led development of a reservation/scheduling platform for SMBs (PHP backend, JS frontend).

9. Full Stack Developer · Haberturk

   Dec 2009 – Sep 2011 · Istanbul

   • Built the initial Haberturk iOS app, including live news streaming over Apple HLS.
   • Built the Haberturk iPad interactive-newspaper app.
   • Migrated a legacy .NET backend to PHP; delivered CMS, publishing, and internal tools.

10. Junior Developer · Pozitim Technology

    Apr 2007 – Apr 2008 · Istanbul

    • Content delivery for WAP and bandwidth-constrained mobile devices.

Skills

Languages

Swift, Objective-C, C/C++, Rust, Python

Frameworks & Platforms

SwiftUI, UIKit, Combine, AVFoundation, ARKit, CoreData, Firebase, WebAssembly

Tooling & Delivery

Fastlane, GitHub Actions, Bitrise, TestFlight, CMake, Xcode Instruments, Git, Docker

Languages

Turkish (native) · English (fluent) · German (B1, actively improving)

Education

B.A., Computer Education and Instructional Technologies — Marmara University, Istanbul, 2003 – 2007