Matthew
Hudson
Engineering director in New York. I lead teams that ship high-performance Next.js platforms at scale, deploying on Vercel. Currently at Code & Theory, leading projects for The Minnesota Star Tribune and RealClearMedia. Previously at Condé Nast, shipping products across The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Bon Appétit, and Epicurious. Plus stints at Betaworks and SeatGeek.
SKILLS
Frontend Architecture
Building performant, accessible web applications at scale. SSR, ISR, React Server Components, and the component systems that tie them together.
Engineering Leadership
Growing teams from 5 to 30+, shipping products on time, driving technical strategy across organizations.
Performance Engineering
Core Web Vitals optimization, edge caching, and load time reduction that move the needle on business metrics.
Platform & DX
CI/CD pipelines, preview deployments, and developer experience that lets teams ship with confidence.
CAREER
Code & Theory
2023 – PresentEngineering Director, Media Experience- Directed ~30 engineers, PMs, and designers across time zones for the Minnesota Star Tribune rebrand & replatform on Next.js/Vercel
- RealClearMedia: Leading company-wide modernization onto Next.js/Vercel/PayloadCMS
- RealClearPolling: Migrated from legacy PHP to Contentful + Next.js/Vercel with Lighthouse/SpeedCurve CI gates ahead of 2024 election
- Partnering with newsroom editors on an AI-augmented white-label CMS initiative
- Star Tribune relaunch recognized by Shorty Awards, Fast Company, and SND
Pager
2021 – 2023Engineering Manager- Led Next.js/React platform for patient care navigation at a >$100M-funded company (NEA, Lux, Goodwater, Horizon BCBS)
- Implemented design system + CI quality gates (Storybook, ESLint, Sonar)
- Cut UI delivery cycle ~40% and lifted patient engagement ~25%
Condé Nast
2015 – 2018Engineering Manager → Engineering Director- Managed managers, led 25–30 engineers across Bon Appétit, Traveler, Epicurious, The New Yorker, and Vanity Fair
- Vanity Fair 'Trump tweet' response: operationalized rapid technical response, 13K new subs in 24 hours — a ~100× day and a CN record
- Drove VF page performance from ~25 → 80–90 PageSpeed; tripled paid subs YoY via coordinated paywall + perf work
- Orchestrated internal web performance efforts, disseminating learnings department-wide with 25% improvement across brands
Betaworks
2013 – 2015Senior Engineer → Engineering Director → Interim CTO- Kandu (kids app creator): Led engineering through $2.4M betaworks-led seed round; shipped iPad no-code creation experience
- AlphaWorks (equity crowdfunding): Stabilized engineering through leadership transition; launched with co-investment from Founder Collective, OATV, Box Group
SeatGeek
2013Senior Frontend Engineer- Early engineer at ~10 employees; built core seat maps, event discovery, and checkout UX impacting conversion during high-traffic events
- Co-developed Sixpack, an open-source A/B testing framework widely adopted beyond SeatGeek
RECOGNITION
OPEN SOURCE
The easiest way to write conditional CSS and/or JavaScript based on device operating system, orientation, and type.
A simple guide to the wonders of Git Hooks.
A JavaScript module for importing, creating, manipulating, and exporting PXON schema.
JS module for generating words from characters. An anagram generator for Letterpress, Words with Friends, and Scrabble.
Sixpack is a language-agnostic A/B testing framework.