Curriculum vitae

Bruce Royce

London, UK (hybrid, remote or on-site) | bruceroyce@yahoo.com | www.linkedin.com/in/bruceroyce

Lead Frontend architect and Engineer

React and TypeScript applications for large datasets, real-time updates and AI-assisted workflows

Summary

Architect and Lead Frontend Engineer with 26 years in web software, 16 of them in frontend. I build React and TypeScript applications for large datasets, real-time collaboration and AI-assisted workflows, and lead teams of 4 to 8 engineers while still writing code. Recent results: cut a 30MB JavaScript bundle to about 1MB at Xapien; moved Legal500 from legacy WordPress to Next.js and raised its Lighthouse performance score from about 45 to 95; converted more than $2.6M a quarter of paid traffic into organic traffic at PetLab Co. Earlier work at the BBC, American Express and Ecwid.

Core Skills

Frontend

  • React, TypeScript, JavaScript, Next.js, Vue, HTML5, CSS/SCSS, Tailwind

Backend & Cloud

  • Node.js, Bun, PHP, Go; Docker; AWS; Strong Backend-for-Frontend boundary design

UI architecture

  • Design systems, WCAG, semantic HTML, responsive UI

Data and state

  • REST APIs, TanStack Query, GraphQL, Zustand, Redux Toolkit, WebSockets

Quality and delivery

  • Jest, Vitest, Storybook, Playwright, CI/CD, observability

Performance and security

  • Core Web Vitals, bundle profiling, secure progressive web apps

Data visualisation

  • D3.js, Chart.js, Tremor, Pixi.js, WebGL; interactive analytics, real-time visualisation and complex data-driven interfaces

Leadership

  • End-to-end ownership, mentoring and cross-functional delivery; distributed team leadership (11+ years) including architecture, performance conversations and feedback

Professional Experience

PetVitae Labore – Founding Engineer, Independent venture

(Jan 2026 – Present | UK)

Bun + TypeScript, Next.js, Tailwind, Strapi (headless CMS)

  • Set up the technical foundations and architecture for an early-stage pet nutrition venture, with full responsibility for delivery.
  • Built a lightweight cloud backend and the frontend, with accessibility and a simple user experience as the priorities

Xapien – Lead Frontend Engineer

(Jun 2025 – Dec 2025 | London, UK)

React (TS), TanStack, Tailwind, Turborepo, Go (for BFF), MongoDB, AWS, Linear

  • Rebuilt the frontend as a thin, modular React application. Moved business logic, data transformers and most route guards into a Go backend-for-frontend, with clear contracts between the backend teams. Led 4–6 engineers.
  • Cut the JavaScript bundle from 30MB to about 1MB and made data loading close to instant with loading pages and several cache levels. Released at least twice a week.

Legal500 – Lead Frontend Engineer

(Jul 2024 – Mar 2025 | London, UK)

Next.js (TS), Tailwind, SWC, Node, GraphQL, Kafka, MongoDB, Azure DevOps, Heroku

  • Led 4–6 engineers moving a legacy PHP/WordPress site to Next.js, with a MongoDB-backed backend-for-frontend and several relational databases consolidated.
  • Built a component library and design system now used by three other departments.
  • Cut the time to deliver changes from several weeks to 5–10 major features per four-week sprint.
  • Raised the Lighthouse performance score from about 45 to 95.
  • Used analytics to find and fix usability problems for legal professionals, working with several departments.

PetLab Co Group – Lead Front-end Engineer

(Jul 2023 – Jun 2024 | London, UK)

Next.js & Gatsby (TS), MySQL, Strapi, Optimizely, AWS

  • Converted more than $2.6M per quarter of paid traffic into organic traffic, cutting direct-marketing spend by that amount.
  • Brought page speed close to 100 with workers and caching, and separated traffic by serving region (UK, US, Germany, Mexico).
  • Led a team of 6 developers (up to 8 in busier sprints) and ran a second team in parallel while its lead was on leave. Mentored developers on architecture and testing and standardised workflows.

British Film Festival – Staff Engineer, Contract

(Mar 2019 – May 2023 | Iver, UK)

Next.js (TS), Node, MySQL, Vercel

  • Built the remote judging platform for close to 1,000 entrants from about 90 countries, covering short and feature films, adverts, music videos, fashion films, animations and game intros.
  • Reworked the customer-facing web application for performance and reliability, leading a distributed team of one employee plus contractors and volunteers, with numbers changing by project.

American Express – Senior Frontend Engineer

(Oct 2015 – Mar 2019 | London, UK)

JavaScript, JSP, Node, React (Legacy)

  • Redesigned digital-product acquisition funnels, added engagement and conversion analytics, and simplified the customer journey with asynchronous, API-driven interactions.

Ecwid/Lightspeed – Senior Software Engineer

(Aug 2013 – Aug 2015 | Prague, CZ)

jQuery, PHP Symfony, AWS

  • Architected high-traffic global payment integrations and developer SDKs.
  • Built secure, accessible web components for financial operations, and improved DevOps pipelines and cross-team integration.

BBC – Lead Engineer (Various)

(2008 – 2013 | London, UK)

JavaScript, VBScript, jQuery, WebGL, Lightning.js, Pixi.js, ASP/ASP.NET

  • Led teams building the BBC’s virtual studio and live graphics control systems.
  • Built real-time analytics, data-visualisation and operational interfaces for broadcast and Smart TV/iPlayer. Early contributor to design system adoption; mentored engineers and aligned editorial and engineering workflows.

Broadcast Graphics – Member of Technical Team

(2000 – 2008 | Seattle, USA)

JavaScript, VBScript, ASP/ASP.NET, C++

  • Designed UI and board-level software for bespoke advanced broadcast-grade graphics systems.

Education

  • MEng, Computer Engineering (Hardware) – University of Tehran, Faculty of Engineering
  • BEng, Mechanical Engineering (Heat and Fluid Mechanics) – University of Tehran, Faculty of Engineering

Additional Certifications

  • BBC Accessibility and Inclusive Design; BBC Test Academy; Apollo GraphQL; Vizrt real-time systems