A Journey of Innovation and Cloud Expertise

Derek DeJonghe’s passion for technology and innovation began early. Even as a young entrepreneur, Derek was already building his first business at the age of 10, providing lawn care and snow removal services to his community using his father’s tractor. This early experience instilled in him a strong work ethic, a knack for problem-solving, and the drive to create solutions.

This entrepreneurial spirit has been a constant throughout Derek’s career. With over 10 years of cloud consulting experience, he excels at helping organizations optimize their development cycle and application delivery. Derek founded Expansive Labs in July 2023, where he currently advises startups on cloud operations and software agility.

Prior to founding Expansive Labs, Derek held several key leadership positions at RightBrain Networks for over 10 years, including Vice President of Engineering and Director of Cloud Architecture. During his time there, he oversaw technical delivery, managed services, and technical partnership audits, enabling his team to excel. Derek also served as Principal Cloud Solutions Architect, leading multiple cloud migration, refactoring, and greenfield application development projects. He has a proven track record of designing and building resilient cloud architectures and was recognized as the highest technical escalation point within RightBrain Networks. This experience has given Derek the insight into how hundreds of the largest companies in the US technology industry manage people, software, and services.

Derek’s expertise spans a broad range of technologies and skills, including Python, Nginx, and Amazon Web Services (AWS). He obtained an AWS Certifications at the Professional level. Derek is also a published author, with works including NGINX Cookbook: Advanced Recipes for High-Performance Load Balancing, Application Delivery and Load Balancing in Microsoft Azure: Practical Solutions with NGINX and Microsoft Azure, NGINX Unit Cookbook: Recipes for Using a Versatile Open Source Server, as well as various other report style books for O’Reilly Media.

Derek’s career is marked by a consistent drive to help teams achieve their goals through effective development practices and innovative cloud solutions.