Backchannel Software

For the way you work.

Custom software built by a development partner with decades of hands-on engineering experience and best-in-class modern tooling. The right solution, faster — on terms that fit your business.

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Capability Spotlight

AI Engineering

AI you can actually depend on. Built as software, not stitched together from prompts.

AI engineering sits at the intersection of four disciplines: backend to build the system, retrieval to feed it the right context, security to keep it safe from misuse, and product thinking to make sure it actually solves a real problem.

System Design

LLMs composed with tools, databases, and sub-agents into a coherent backend.

Tight Contracts

Typed schemas and predictable APIs. Rigid scaffolding around fuzzy models.

Retrieval

Chunking, embeddings, reranking — the right context at the right time.

Reliability

Retries, timeouts, graceful degradation. Failure modes handled by default.

Safety

Prompt-injection defense, input & output validation, enforced permission boundaries.

Evals & Observability

Measured quality. End-to-end tracing. Verifiable in production, not just in demos.

AI is unpredictable on its own. The software around it has to be reliable, safe, measurable, and genuinely useful.

Services

The right software, not more software.

Built around what you actually need — informed by decades of knowing what works and what doesn't.

AI Engineering

LLM-powered features built the way the rest of your software is built — tight contracts, retrieval, reliability, safety, and evals. See how →

Web & Mobile Apps

Full-stack applications built for how your team actually works — responsive and mobile-friendly from the start. Dashboards, internal tools, customer-facing platforms — functional, fast, and maintainable on any device.

APIs & Integrations

Connect the tools you already use. Syncing platforms, building a new API, or wiring third-party services together — your systems, working as one.

Automation

Workflow orchestration, scripts, and integrations that replace manual, repetitive work. Scheduled jobs, cross-system syncs, and operational glue — the plumbing that quietly saves hours every week.

Data & Pipelines

Get your data under control. Pipelines that collect, clean, and move your data where it needs to go — so you can stop wrestling spreadsheets and start making decisions.

Technical Strategy

Not sure what to build? Architecture reviews, technology selection, and honest guidance about where to invest your budget — before a line of code gets written.

How It Works

Straightforward from start to finish.

No mysteries, no handoff chain, no scope surprises. You work directly with the person building your software.

Understand

Your business, your problems, your definition of success. Everything starts with listening. No assumptions.

Plan

A clear scope, realistic timeline, and honest assessment of what to build first. You know exactly what you're getting.

Build

Iterative development with regular check-ins. You see working software early and often — not a big reveal at the end.

Support

Launch isn't the end. Ongoing maintenance, fixes, and evolution as your needs change. The software grows with you.

Billing that fits

Every engagement is shaped around what actually fits your business. Some clients prefer a low-commitment monthly subscription where we build, host, and operate the software for them. Others want a modest setup fee paired with a lower ongoing rate, or a traditional build-and-own arrangement with us on retainer to keep things running. And when a product we build has legs beyond a single client, we'll often partner on a shared model that brings the cost down further. The shape of the deal follows the shape of your business — not the other way around.

About

Decades of building software.

Backchannel Software is a Baltimore-based development studio led by Johnny Boursiquot — a seasoned engineer with decades of experience across industries, stacks, and scales. The approach: pair that experience with best-in-class modern tooling to deliver custom software faster, at a fraction of the typical cost.

Johnny is a certified cloud engineer, holds multiple degrees in computer and information sciences, speaks regularly at tech conferences, and has trained engineers around the world. The same experience he shares on stage is what he brings to client work — no agency overhead, no ramp-up time.

Johnny Boursiquot speaking at GopherCon 2023

Johnny Boursiquot training a classroom of engineers

Contact

Let's talk about what you need.

Whether you have a clear project in mind or just want to talk through an idea, reach out. No sales pitch — just a conversation about whether it's a good fit.

info@backchannelsoftware.com

In the Baltimore area?

Happy to meet in person over coffee if that's more convenient — just mention it when you reach out.