Services
Slide decks and consultant buzzwords — Real engineering from one practitioner who writes the code and runs the clusters, pipelines and deployments himself.
Who delivers this work
Every service on this page is delivered by the founder himself — founder-led, with no account layer in between. Specialists join only when a project needs expertise outside that scope; they are named and agreed beforehand, and delivery accountability stays with Appetizer Labs UG. Because capacity is limited, only a few projects run in parallel — we confirm availability before writing a proposal.
How delivery works →Cloud-Native Strategy
Cloud-native doesn't mean moving VMs to EC2 and calling it done. We assess your current state, build a realistic roadmap, and plan migrations that actually work — not just on paper.
- Cloud-readiness assessment of your existing systems
- Migration strategy: re-platform, re-architect, or hybrid — based on the business case
- Cost-benefit analysis and ROI planning for cloud investments
- Vendor lock-in evaluation and multi-cloud considerations
- Organizational readiness: teams, processes, skills
Kubernetes & Container Orchestration
Running Kubernetes in production isn't a weekend project. We build clusters that stay stable under load, are secure, and can be operated by your team.
- Production-grade Kubernetes clusters (EKS, self-managed, on-prem)
- Service mesh and observability — because flying blind isn't an option
- Container strategies, image pipelines, and registry management
- Namespace strategies, RBAC, and network policies
- Migration of existing workloads to container platforms
AWS Cloud Architecture
Using AWS properly means more than spinning up EC2 instances. We design architectures following the Well-Architected Framework and make sure your cloud bill doesn't contain any surprises.
- Well-Architected reviews and optimization recommendations
- Multi-account strategies and landing zones with AWS Organizations
- Cost optimization: Reserved Instances, Savings Plans, right-sizing
- Security baseline: IAM, GuardDuty, Config, CloudTrail
- High-availability and disaster recovery architectures
DevOps & Platform Engineering
Infrastructure that doesn't slow developers down. Pipelines that run in minutes. Developer platforms that enable self-service instead of producing tickets.
- CI/CD pipelines that are actually reliable
- Infrastructure as Code with proven patterns
- GitOps workflows for declarative infrastructure
- Internal developer platforms for self-service
- Observability stack: monitoring, logging, tracing — integrated, not stitched together
Architecture Modernization
The monolith doesn't have to die in a day. We help you modernize step by step — reduce tech debt, carve out services, think event-driven.
- Monolith-to-microservices strategies (Strangler Fig, Branch by Abstraction)
- Tech debt analysis with a concrete paydown plan and prioritization
- Event-driven architecture: events, commands, CQRS where it makes sense
- Domain-Driven Design for clean service boundaries
- API strategy and versioning for sustainable interfaces
Software Development
We build software — not just infrastructure. Backends, APIs, frontends, mobile apps. Go, TypeScript, React, Svelte — whatever fits the problem.
- Backend development: Go, TypeScript/Node.js, REST & GraphQL APIs
- Frontend engineering: React, Svelte, Astro — performant and maintainable
- Fullstack prototypes and MVPs in weeks, not months
- Code reviews, pair programming, knowledge transfer with your team
- Test automation, CI/CD integration, and production readiness
Platform engineering in full
The platform work above has a page of its own: how to recognise the bottleneck, what is included, what is not, how an engagement runs, and which entry offer fits it.
Kubernetes in full
The cluster work above has a page of its own: how to recognise a half-finished cluster, what “production-ready” actually means, what is included — and when Kubernetes is the wrong choice.
Cloud modernization in full
The modernization work above has a page of its own: when a rewrite is the wrong answer, how a migration is cut into waves, and what you keep at the end.
Engineering Growth Assessment
The fixed-scope entry point: we establish whether your organization, platform and technical leadership can carry the next stage of growth — and where to invest first. You get a risk map, a prioritized action plan and a readout for the executive level.
Delivery Bottleneck Assessment
For when delivery has become slow, risky or unpredictable. We walk the route of a change from decision to production and find the few points that limit throughput — technical, procedural or ownership. You get a bottleneck map, a ranked backlog and a plan for the months ahead.
Not sure which of these you need?
Then start with the analysis. The Platform Bottleneck Assessment is an engagement of its own, with a fixed scope and a fixed price. We find out what is slowing your delivery down, and you get it in writing — prioritized, with a roadmap. What happens next is your decision.
Platform Recovery Sprint
For when the path to production no longer holds: a fixed-scope engagement with a fixed end date — baselines, ownership and one golden path on a real service, with merged changes instead of recommendations.
Kubernetes Platform Build
For when the platform still has to be built: twelve fixed-scope weeks that end with ten conditions met — each one checked by your team rather than asserted by us.
Which of the three fits your situation?
Three fixed-scope engagements, in the order they usually follow each other. You rarely need all three — one of them normally answers the question you have right now.
| Criterion | Platform Bottleneck Assessment | Platform Recovery Sprint | Kubernetes Platform Build |
|---|---|---|---|
| The question it answers | What is holding our delivery up, and in which order do we fix it? | How do we get our path to production to hold again? | What will our applications run on, and who operates it? |
| When it fits | You can tell something is stuck, but your team does not agree on what. | You know what is stuck and want it fixed on a real service. | There is no platform yet that carries your path to production. |
| Duration | 5 working days of analysis, spread over 3 weeks. | 4 weeks with a fixed end date, with 12 days of our time inside them. | 12 weeks in four sections, with 36 days of our time inside them. |
| What your team puts in | Read access to code, pipelines and monitoring, interviews with six to ten people, one contact who can decide. | About one day a week per team member involved: deciding, reviewing, merging. | About one day a week again, plus a cloud account, an identity provider and a named owner for the platform. |
| What exists on the last day | Six written results: bottleneck register, quick wins, target state and a roadmap for the next 90 days. | Merged changes in your repositories and one reference service running on them. | 10 conditions that are either met or not — each one demonstrated, rehearsed or measured. |
| What can follow | A sprint, a build, or none of them. That decision is separate from the engagement. | You extend the golden path to further services — with us or without us. | Your team runs the platform and onboards further workloads on its own. |
All three are fixed-price engagements. We do not publish a price list — the price comes with the proposal, together with the scope, before you commit to anything.
Workshops & Enablement
For when your team should carry the work forward on its own. Six formats with a fixed scope, a fixed duration and a capped group size — from Go through Kubernetes operations to a facilitated architecture decision.
Where is it stuck for you?
Before you pick a service: eight questions on delivery, architecture, operations and ownership, scored in your browser. The result names the weakest area and what you can do about it first, on your own.
Where does your platform stand overall?
The diagnostic looks for the weakest spot; the scorecard shows the whole picture: ten areas from delivery to team knowledge, four levels each, scored in your browser. You get a level per area and the next step for the three weakest.
The checklist to take away
The long version of the diagnostic, on paper: twenty-four statements about your path to production, meant to be worked through as a team rather than clicked through in a browser. What stays unticked is the bottleneck — and the way into an assessment. PDF, no form.
Frequently asked questions
How does an engagement start?
With a short first conversation by email or LinkedIn — no lead form. We then use a compact discovery block to clarify goals, bottlenecks, and risks, and turn that into a prioritized implementation plan.
Do you work remotely or on site?
Remote-first. On-site sessions in North Rhine-Westphalia are possible, and we run projects across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
Will we depend on you once the project ends?
No. Knowledge transfer, documentation, and joint delivery with your team are part of the project. We build platforms your own team can operate.
Which technologies do you work with?
On the platform side: Kubernetes (EKS, self-managed, on-prem), AWS, infrastructure as code, and GitOps. In software development: Go, TypeScript, React, Svelte, and Astro. We pick what fits the problem, not what we prefer.
We already have a platform team — what would you add?
We do not replace your platform team and we do not take it over. We come in for one bounded question: an architecture decision the team is split on, a cluster upgrade that keeps slipping, a golden path that exists on paper and nobody uses. The work happens with the team — pairing, reviews, decisions written down in your repository — not around it. Without a team to absorb it, the handover at the end would be worthless. If your team already knows the answer and simply has no hours, what you need is capacity. We do not sell capacity and we do not place a person into an open role. Contractors or a staffing partner are the honest answer to that.
We really just need one more engineer. Is that what you do?
One more engineer solves a volume problem. We come in when the bottleneck is a decision or missing experience — Kubernetes in production, a migration that has failed twice, a pipeline nobody will touch. Those do not clear up with more hands; they clear up when someone who has made the decision before makes it with you. After that your team carries on without us. For a permanently staffed role — running the platform, on-call, the ticket queue — hiring or a contractor is cheaper and fits better. We are not a staffing supplier and we do not take over operations.
We cannot give you production access. Does that rule you out?
Assessment, architecture and infrastructure-as-code work run without production access: repositories, configuration, metrics, cost reports and conversations with the team give a reliable picture. Where something has to be touched in production, we work through your people — shared screen, your hands on the keyboard. NDA and data processing agreement are settled up front, not alongside. With neither production access nor access to the people who have it, a root cause cannot be found. That is not enough for an outage in progress — what remains is an assessment of what you can show us.
When we are not the right fit
Said up front so nobody loses a week on it: we turn these down. Not because the work is bad, but because someone else does it better. Ask and we will point you at them.
Round-the-clock operations, on-call cover and SLA-backed run responsibility
We build platforms and hand them over ready to run. Running them is a different business — a managed-service provider can commit to that, we cannot.
Certificates, audit sign-off and conformity statements
Engineering work towards ISO 27001, NIS2 or the EU AI Act is in scope. Issuing the attestation is not: that takes an accredited auditor, not an engineer.
Projects with no in-house engineering team
Knowledge transfer is part of every engagement. With no team to hand over to it turns into permanent outsourcing — a model we do not offer.
Transformation programmes with many parallel workstreams
Past roughly four concurrent streams you need a delivery organization. We work in a small setup; anything else would mean buying in people we do not know.
A fixed price for a whole transformation, quoted before anyone has looked
Pricing an unexamined legacy estate is guesswork. We estimate after a short assessment — and we will say so when the rebuild is not worth it.
ERP module consulting, customizing and ABAP development
Cloud-native engineering around an existing ERP estate is our work. Inside the module itself you want people who do nothing else all day.