Fractional technical leadership without the full-time cost.
Most early-stage companies and scale-ups don't need — and can't yet afford — a full-time CTO. But they do need someone who can set the technical direction, evaluate the existing architecture, hire well, and make the decisions that prevent expensive rework later. Our fractional CTO service gives you a senior technical leader for 2–3 days per week, embedded in your leadership team.
What's included
- 2–3 days per week fractional engagement, long-term
- Technical strategy and 6–12 month roadmap ownership
- Architecture review and technical debt prioritisation
- Engineering hiring: job specs, interviews, culture bar-setting
- Vendor and tooling evaluation and selection
- Board and investor technical due diligence support
- Engineering team structure and process design
- Escalation point for the engineering team on complex decisions
How we deliver
- 1Initial technical audit and 90-day action plan
- 2Technology radar and stack recommendations
- 3Engineering hiring framework and interview process
- 4Architecture decision records and documented technical strategy
- 5Monthly executive summary for leadership and board
- 6Transition plan and documentation when engagement ends
Technologies we use
- System Design
- Cloud Architecture
- API Design
- Database Design
- Security
- CI/CD
- DevOps
- Team Processes
Why Origin for CTO-as-a-Service
Practitioners, not advisors
Our fractional CTOs have built and led engineering teams at scale — they've written the code, made the architectural mistakes, and learned from them. They give you hard-won judgment, not consultant frameworks.
Focused on decisions that compound
A fractional CTO's job is to identify the 10% of decisions that determine 90% of outcomes — the ones that, if made badly, cost 10× to fix later. We focus relentlessly on those, not on being in every meeting.
Scales with your growth stage
What you need at seed is different from Series A, which is different again at Series B. We adjust engagement intensity, focus areas, and deliverables as your company grows — and help you hire the right full-time CTO when the time comes.
Industries we serve
“We were non-technical founders with a working product and a Series A closing. We needed someone who could evaluate our architecture, fix our hiring process, and represent us technically in due diligence. Our fractional CTO from Origin did all three. Worth every penny.”
Frequently asked questions
- When does it make sense to hire a fractional CTO vs a full-time one?
- Fractional makes sense when you need senior technical leadership but can't yet justify a £200–350k/year full-time hire — typically pre-Series A or early Series A. Once your engineering team exceeds 10–15 people and technical decisions are happening daily at a rate that needs full-time attention, you're ready for a full-time CTO. We'll tell you when we think you've reached that point.
- How many days per week do you engage?
- Typically 2–3 days per week, though this varies by stage. Early-stage companies often need more initial intensity (5 days for the first month during audit and strategy setting), then reducing to 2 days ongoing. We'll recommend the right intensity for your situation.
- Can you help us hire a full-time CTO when we're ready?
- Yes — and this is one of the most valuable things we do. Because we've been inside your company, we can write an accurate job spec, evaluate candidates against what your specific situation actually requires, and onboard the new CTO properly. Most hiring processes for CTOs fail because neither side knows what 'good' looks like for that specific context.