Alex Conesa

Alexandre Conesa, better known as Alex Conesa, is a software architect and technology executive (Software Architect, CTO, CIO) with more than 30 years designing software and leading the architecture of mission-critical systems. Executive responsibility followed from that work, including CEO of a company of 200+ people. He has worked across retail, payments, finance, public administration, telecommunications, healthcare and regulated medical technology, in 14 countries on three continents, and he is based in Dallas, Texas.

He architected a retail point-of-sale platform that reached 50,000+ retail locations across 14 countries, whose IP was acquired by German and Italian firms and later by a multinational retail group; designed the security architecture of a national instant interbank payment system used by tens of millions of people; cut a major European marketplace's infrastructure cost by 87.5% (about €400,000 to €50,000 a month) while it scaled to 19 million monthly active users; restored a public authority's stalled ERP core in 48 hours and then delivered a documented 30%+ efficiency gain; and led a company of 200+ employees as CEO after a technical turnaround. His work received the IBM EMEA Innovation Award in 2001 and 2002 and an OECD best-practice designation in 2023, and he is primary inventor on a U.S. patent application filed in 2025.

Three kinds. Founders and new ventures that need a hands-on CTO to design and build a product — software, hardware or both — that will scale. Established, family-owned and smaller companies that need a CIO or technology leader to modernize systems, restructure IT, build new products or services and adopt AI safely. And CEOs, boards and recruiters hiring a permanent, interim or fractional technology executive.

Yes — as part of his architecture and executive work, not as a separate AI practice. He helps organizations decide where AI creates measurable value, what data it may access, whether to use hosted, private or hybrid deployment, how to integrate it with existing systems, and who stays accountable for its decisions. That work rests on his record: the security architecture of a national interbank payment system, access controls protecting a public authority's payroll and financial data, regulated medical-imaging platforms whose data pipelines feed AI-based processing, and an advisory-board seat at an AI-native procurement technology company.

I designed and built the software that thousands of retailers around the world run their businesses on — that is the CTO. Then I became the CIO inside those businesses, accountable for the transformation and the expansion, for the systems in production and for the people running them. Most technology leaders are one or the other. I have spent my career being both, which is why I can see a problem from the architecture and from the P&L at the same time.

My career has always been rooted in designing software systems and technical architecture, with executive responsibility following from that work. Throughout my career I have frequently held executive titles — CTO, CIO, CEO — while continuing to act as the principal software architect responsible for the conception, design and implementation of the systems that formed the core technology of each organization. The executive titles exist because I was the principal architect and technology leader, not the reverse.

Yes, and it is how I lead. Recently I built C++ firmware from the ground up for a medical-device company in California, and over the last two years I have built SaaS platforms at scale. Staying in the code lets me make and check the hard trade-offs myself, and coach engineers by example — showing how, not only saying what. A company gets business judgment and technical leadership from someone who can still sit down and build. I am happy to go into detail on any of it.

All three. I work with CEOs, founders and boards as a permanent, interim or fractional CTO/CIO. Permanent executive roles are actively considered — not only advisory or interim engagements.

Retail, finance, public administration, telecommunications, healthcare and regulated medical technology, plus industrial and payments environments. The common thread is systems an organization depends on to sell, to get paid, to serve citizens, and to keep operating when something goes wrong.

Based in Dallas, Texas, working internationally across the U.S., Canada, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia. I work in English, Spanish and Catalan.

The IBM EMEA Innovation Award twice — 2001 in Palm Springs and 2002 in Milan — for innovation in retail and point-of-sale systems; a Technological Innovation Award at IFEMA, Madrid, in 2003; an OECD publication in 2023 naming a public digital-education and employability program I designed and led as a European best practice; primary inventor on a U.S. patent application for authenticating and securing digital images, filed 2025; an invited expert panelist role at the International Congress of Telework in Costa Rica in 2024, co-authoring The San Jose Declaration; and a 2025 Octane Tech Awards finalist placement for Best Emerging Disruptor.

Write directly — I answer personally, in English, Spanish or Catalan. Use the contact form on this page, email me at the address shown there, or message me on LinkedIn.