What a technical mercenary is
A mercenary is the senior engineer you bring in when the team is stuck, the deadline is real, and the problem is above the current team's pay grade. Not a staffing agency placement and not a strategy deck. One experienced operator who owns a hard problem, ships it, and leaves the team stronger than before.
At 7Sigma that person is Principal Rob Christian: 25 years at enterprise scale, former Chief Architect, now founder and CEO of DRM3, still writing production code every week.
Typical missions
- Firefighting: An outage, a data problem, a security hole, or a launch that is slipping.
- The hard part: The integration, the migration, the AI pipeline, or the architecture change the team keeps deferring.
- Carry the build: A contractor or agency left and the product is half done.
- Vibe coded to production: An AI-generated app that needs to scale and stop breaking. See vibe coded app rescue.
- Due diligence and triage: A straight read on a codebase before money or a decision moves.
- Interim technical lead: Hold the seat, set the standards, and help hire the person who keeps it.
How 7Sigma runs it
Direct contact with the person doing the work. 7Sigma works in your repos, your process, and your tools, and sets the architecture and delivery pipeline when none exists. Engagements are scoped to a mission, run intense, and end with documentation, codified conventions, and a handoff. When the mission is bigger than one seat, 7Sigma vets and refers senior engineers to fill it.
Who hires a mercenary
- Founders with a deadline and a team that has hit its ceiling.
- CTOs who need senior capacity on one critical workstream without a long hire.
- Non-technical founders who need a first technical call they can trust.
- Regulated and data-heavy products, including health tech and AI, where the mistakes are expensive.
Based near UCF in Orlando, Florida. Clients nationwide, mostly remote.
Frequently asked questions
What does a technical mercenary cost compared to an agency?
You pay for one senior engineer's time and get the architect, the builder, and the operator in that one seat. There is no agency margin, no junior bench, and no ramp. Pricing is scoped to the mission after a short assessment.
How quickly can a mercenary start?
Fast. Book a call, share access, and triage can begin the same week for active fires. Larger missions start with a short assessment and a written plan.
Is this the same as a fractional CTO?
It overlaps. A fractional CTO engagement is ongoing leadership. A mercenary mission is a scoped, intense push on one hard problem. Many clients start with a mission and keep 7Sigma on as fractional CTO. See the fractional CTO page for the ongoing model.
Will my team learn from it or just get a fix?
Both. Every mission ends with documentation, conventions in the repo, and a handoff. Your team keeps the knowledge and the standards, not a dependency on 7Sigma.
Do you work remotely and outside Florida?
Yes. 7Sigma is based near UCF in Orlando and works with clients across the United States, mostly remote, inside your tools.