// CTO as a Service
From idea to app in production in under a month.
Your full engineering team, without hiring a single developer. We validate with real code, not mockups.
Trusted by
The problem
You can't validate without a product
Interviews and mockups won't tell you whether anyone will use your product. Only people actually using it will.
Hiring a team burns runway before you validate
A CTO and two developers mean hundreds of thousands of euros a year committed before you have a single metric.
You can't assess developers
Without technical judgement, hiring is a bet. And a bad hire is paid for in lost months.
You don't need to hire a team. You need to ship.
Three phases, one goal: move forward with data
Validation Sprint
We put your app in the hands of real users. Production code, cloud infrastructure and metrics from minute one. It's not a prototype: it's the foundation everything else is built on.
- + PRODUCTION CODE
- + REAL INFRASTRUCTURE
- + USAGE ANALYTICS
MVP Detection
We don't guess what to build. We analyse how your first users behave and define a clear MVP together. We build what the data asks for.
- + DATA-DRIVEN PRIORITISATION
- + WEEKLY ITERATION
- + FIXED BUDGET
CTO as a Service
A full engineering team as a service. Architecture decisions, support and evolution. Scale up or down as your stage demands, with no lock-in.
- + ARCHITECTURE DECISIONS
- + SUPPORT & EVOLUTION
- + TECHNICAL ROADMAP
How we work
Week 1
Scope and architecture
Two workshops with you to define what gets built and what doesn't. We come out with scope closed, architecture decided and the environment running.
Weeks 2-3
Build
We build with a demo every week. You see the product working, not a progress report.
Week 4
Production, metrics and handover
Real deployment, analytics live and a full handover: repository, infrastructure and documentation in your hands.
What we need from you: 2 workshops in week one and a 30-minute demo each week. Nothing else.
What the service includes
Infrastructure on any cloud
Automated CI/CD
Product metrics and analytics
Security and access control
Architecture decisions
Support and on-call
Technical roadmap
Due diligence readiness
You leave with a product, not with legal debt.
What we build survives due diligence. From the first commit.
In a seed round investors review code ownership, freelancer IP assignments, open source licences, governance of AI-generated code and GDPR compliance. Gaps don't just delay the round: they condition the closing, force renegotiation with the agency that kept ownership, or cut the valuation. A normal agency delivers code; we deliver code plus the file that survives due diligence. And we stand beside you through the whole dataroom and the investor round.
The code is yours from commit 1
Repository in your organisation, not ours. Full assignment of economic rights by contract, with guaranteed assignment from every collaborator of ours. Chain of ownership documented and traceable in the Git history.
Open source and licence inventory
A project SBOM: which libraries go in, under which licence, and verification that no strong copyleft (GPL/AGPL) contaminates the core of a proprietary product. It's the first thing an investor asks for and the thing nobody has.
GDPR built into the architecture
Data minimisation, tracking off by default, a consent manager in the code itself with an auditable log (timestamp + policy version), and data subject rights endpoints from day one. Complying later costs 10× more.
Vendors mapped and under DPA
Cloud, analytics, email, error tracking: a list of who touches personal data, with their Data Processing Agreement located and international transfers reviewed. Your lawyer signs; we hand them the map already drawn.
Legal texts that describe your real product
Privacy policy, cookies, legal notice and T&Cs aligned with what the app actually does, not a copied template. The mismatch between policy and product is one of the most frequent grounds for complaints before data protection authorities.
AI with governance
If your product uses AI: risk-level classification under the EU AI Act and labelling of generated content. In our own process, documented human review of AI-assisted code so your copyright is defensible.
Accessibility (EAA)
WCAG 2.1 AA compliant components and automated accessibility tests in CI. Avoids the expensive refactor when the European Accessibility Act applies to you, and unlocks corporate and public sector sales.
“In a round, due diligence asks who owns the code, which licences it carries inside and whether you comply with GDPR. If the answer isn't ready, the closing slips or the valuation drops. We hand it to you in writing.”
From day one we document ownership, licences, privacy and AI governance. When the investor arrives, your file is ready.
We are not lawyers. We do not provide legal advice. We are engineers: we build the product and document code ownership, the licence inventory, the vendor map and the privacy architecture so your law firm can review, validate and sign off with confidence.
Security from the first commit, not once you already have customers inside.
The holes that sink a startup are always the same ones. We close them before they exist.
Your first enterprise customer sends a security questionnaire before signing, and not being able to answer it blocks the deal. Since 2026 VCs formally assess security posture as part of Series A due diligence. And the incidents that do the most damage — leaked secrets, open buckets, IDOR across tenants, endpoints without rate limiting, hardcoded credentials, live access for ex-employees — are avoidable by design from commit 1.
Secrets out of the code
A managed secret manager (Secret Manager, Vault) and automatic secret scanning in the repo and CI. No API key ever lives in a commit. It's the most frequent leak and the most expensive: a leaked cloud key grants total access to production.
Real isolation between customers
Object-level authorisation verified across critical flows (IDOR/BOLA). In a multi-tenant SaaS, a user being able to read another's data by changing an ID is an instant deal killer with enterprise, and the most common authorisation flaw in APIs.
Identity and access
MFA on everything critical (cloud, repos, CI/CD, admin panels), least privilege, personal not shared accounts, and effective revocation when someone leaves. Separate dev/staging/production environments, with no real data in development.
Cloud without holes
IAM reviewed, zero accidental public storage, encryption in transit and at rest, automatic backups with a real restore test. A backup that has never been restored is not a backup.
Abuse protection
Rate limiting on sensitive endpoints, brute force protection on login, and cost limits on expensive operations. Without this, a scraper or a bad loop spikes your cloud bill and takes the service down.
Observability and incident response
Centralised access and error logs, alerts that reach an actual person, and a written plan: who acts, how it's contained, who is notified and within what deadline. In an incident, not knowing what happened is perceived worse than the breach itself. In Phase 3, production alerts are part of the service.
Dependencies under watch
Continuous CVE scanning across libraries and containers, with clear remediation criteria for critical ones. Your product is only as secure as the least maintained library it drags along.
Our own security audit
We review infrastructure and code looking for these classes of flaw, classify by severity and deliver a prioritised remediation plan. It's not marketing: it's the same work we do on our own products.
“A startup doesn't sink because a feature is missing. It sinks because someone changes an ID in the URL and reads another customer's data.”
We build security as part of the product, not as a checklist afterwards. That's how you pass the enterprise customer questionnaire and the round's due diligence without surprises.
The real cost of building a team
| ITEM | IN-HOUSE TEAM | THE STOICAL DEVELOPERS |
|---|---|---|
| Salaries (CTO + 2 developers) | ~€240,000 / year | Variable cost |
| Social security and benefits | ~€72,000 / year | €0 |
| Time until you have a team | 3-6 months | Days |
| Churn risk | High | None |
| Lock-in | Indefinite | No lock-in |
You pay for real progress, not for structure.
4+
apps in production
+15
years of experience
<30
days to the first production release
Pricing
Validation Sprint
€12,000
Fixed price · under 1 month
Your app in production with real users, infrastructure and metrics. The repository is yours from day 1.
- + Scope closed in week 1
- + Weekly demo
- + Production + analytics
MVP
Fixed quote
After validation
With real data on the table, we define the MVP and quote it as a fixed price. No surprises, no open-ended hours.
- + Data-based scope
- + Fixed price
- + Fortnightly deliveries
CTO as a Service
From €3,500/month
No lock-in
A full engineering team as a service. You adjust the dedication to your stage and cancel whenever you want.
- + Adjustable dedication
- + Support and on-call
- + Roadmap and architecture
Frequently asked questions
Is the code mine?+
Yes. The repository is yours from day 1 and we work inside it. When we finish you keep everything: code, infrastructure and documentation.
What happens after the first month?+
You decide. You can continue with us in MVP or CTO as a Service mode, stop, or take it to an in-house team. There's no lock-in.
What if my idea is very complex?+
We narrow it down. In week 1 we define which part gets validated first. We never try to build everything at once: we look for the smallest version that generates real data.
How much involvement do I need?+
Two workshops in the first week and a 30-minute demo each week. We handle the rest.
Which technologies do you work with?+
Whichever fit your product best, and we deploy on any cloud. We choose boring, proven technology, not whatever is trending.
Are you lawyers?+
No. We do not provide legal advice. We are engineers: we implement the product meeting the technical requirements, inventory licences, map vendors and prepare the documentation so your legal advisor can review, validate and sign it.
Do you work for equity?+
Our model is a service with a fixed price. In specific cases we can discuss a portion in equity, but it's never the basis of the agreement.
CTO as a Service vs. hiring an in-house CTO
Real cost, time to production and risk of each option, with Spanish market numbers.
Tell us about your company
We reply within 1 business day.