Fractional CTO for Non-Technical Founders
A fractional CTO for non-technical founders whose product is live, but whose developer, agency or AI tool is no longer there to answer for it. One person takes over the technical side: the product stays up, gets fixed, and improves every month. You follow every request, choice and delivery in one portal.
What you hand over, and what you get back
You hand over access: the code, the hosting, the accounts. A fractional CTO for non-technical founders gives you back one person who answers for all of it.
- The code read end to end, with a written verdict on what you own.
- Monitoring on the product, so problems are caught before your customers report them.
- Incidents taken within two business hours and owned until the fix is live.
- Fixes and improvements every month, each priced before it starts and checked against criteria you can read.
- Defects in work we delivered, fixed at no charge.
Decisions explained in plain words
Technical choices reach you as questions you can answer without a technical background. Each one says what changes for your customers and what each option implies.
Your answer is recorded with its date, so the reasons behind the product stay readable a year later, for you and for whoever joins next.
How pricing works
The fractional CTO here is La Résidence: a guarantee plus the work, never hours. For a founder who cannot judge an engineer's day, that is the point: the guarantee is one fixed line a month, and every piece of work is priced before it starts, in a request you can read.
Seats are capped, so the audit decides: every seat starts with our code audit services, and when the seats are full, the next free seat is offered in order.
An outsourced tech team, without the team
Many founders look for an outsourced tech team for non-technical founders: an agency, or a few freelancers to coordinate. Here the team is one person and the agents that do the delivery volume, inside rules written for your codebase.
The reading, the decisions and the name on the result stay human. You deal with one person, who knows the code line by line.
What it looks like in practice
For a home dog-boarding business, thirteen requests were delivered in the first month, with a median of one day between a request and its delivery, each checked against criteria the founder can read.
If you are still at the idea or prototype stage, start with MVP Development Services.
Who it is for, and who it is not for
For
Founders without a technical background whose product is live, built by a freelancer, an agency or an AI tool, with nobody technical left in-house.
Not for
- A full-time hire, or someone who attends your meetings.
- Developers placed in your team, or hours sold by the day.
- IT support for computers and networks.
- A product you would rather run alone, with nobody on call: that is ITzWorking Agents.
Fractional CTO or full-time hire
| Fractional CTO | Full-time CTO | |
|---|---|---|
| Start | After the audit, when a seat is open | After a hiring search |
| Commitment | Twelve months, billed monthly | Employment contract |
| Development | One person answers for it, the agents do the volume | Needs a team |
| Answers for the product | Yes | Yes |
Questions founders ask
How much does a fractional CTO charge?
Many charge a day rate or a monthly retainer for advice. Here the price is the guarantee plus the work: from €3,975 a month, €1,200 of it for the guarantee and the rest for at least 5,000 credits of work, each piece priced before it starts.
What are the risks of hiring a fractional CTO?
The main one is depending on one person. Everything stays in your name from day one: the code, the infrastructure, the accounts, and documentation kept current. The handover is documented and priced, so you can take the product in-house or elsewhere whole.
When should a company hire a fractional CTO?
When the product is live and nobody technical answers for it: the developer left, the agency stopped answering, or customers find the bugs first. Before the product exists, start with the build.
What La Résidence costs
A guarantee plus the work, never hours.
- The guarantee, €1,200 a month: incidents taken within two business hours, Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 18:00 Paris time. Miss one, and that month's guarantee is free.
- The work: at least 5,000 credits a month, each request priced in credits before it starts.
- From €3,975 a month in total, on a twelve-month engagement billed monthly.
- It starts with the audit: €2,000, the whole codebase read in 48 hours, credited against your first month.
Seats are capped. When they are full, the audit still runs, the verdict is still yours, and the next free seat is offered in order.
How we work together
- The audit first: you connect the repository, and the code and the infrastructure are read end to end, with a written verdict and a plan.
- The debrief: one hour on the verdict, the plan on the table, your questions answered.
- Monitoring, backups and access set up in your name, then a monthly rhythm of fixes and improvements.
- Every piece of work priced before it starts, and visible while it runs.
Who answers for it
Julien Casse, founder of ITzWorking. Shipping software since 2010: fintech in Luxembourg, then co-founder and CTO of kodehyve, from sole developer to a team of twenty.
He reads the code himself and makes the calls the model cannot. The client list is short on purpose: one named person answers for your product. Read more about the founder
Fractional CTO for Non-Technical Founders