Chapter 1 Origin Story
I'm Lamine Diallo — founder of Kalinko Labs and Kalinko Store, two businesses I run from Conakry, Guinea.
I got into tech in 2011 and never looked back. Fourteen years later, I'm still building — though the animated GIFs are long gone and I've traded PHP spaghetti for Elixir and properly structured Laravel apps.
Chapter 2 What I've Built
A few numbers that tell the story
Chapter 3 How I Work
I approach every problem with curiosity first. Before writing a single line of code, I dig into understanding why something needs to exist and who it's for.
My principles are simple:
*Make it boring.* The best code is the code you don't have to think about. I'd rather have a straightforward solution that anyone can understand than a clever one that only I can debug.
*Automate the tedious stuff.* If I'm doing something manually more than twice, there's a script for that. Life's too short for repetitive tasks.
*Ship, learn, iterate.* Perfect is the enemy of done. I believe in getting things in front of users quickly and improving based on real feedback.
Chapter 4 The Journey
Making quality technology accessible in Guinea. Kalinko Store imports and sells refurbished and new laptops, smartphones, and tablets at 40-60% below traditional retail prices.
What we do:
- Device Sourcing: Import certified refurbished and new devices directly from the United States
- Quality Assurance: Test and certify all devices before sale with 3-month warranty
- Customer Support: Free training on Windows and Microsoft Office, 24/7 support in local languages
- Market Impact: Serve students, schools, businesses, and government agencies across Guinea
As a Senior Software Engineer at Hyphen, LLC, I have been instrumental in developing, optimizing, and modernizing core platform services that drive the company’s lending operations. My work has focused on enhancing system scalability, improving maintainability, and increasing business efficiency through strategic technological advancements.
Key Contributions:
- Loan Underwriting Automation: Led the development and refinement of the loan underwriting service using CodeIgniter, MySQL, and jQuery, automating and streamlining the lending process.
- Core Service Development: Took on increasing responsibility for designing and evolving multiple core services, significantly enhancing platform scalability and robustness.
- Technology Modernization: Directed a major transition from CodeIgniter to Laravel and from jQuery to Vue.js, enabling a more modern, efficient, and maintainable web architecture.
- Business Impact: Played a pivotal role in advancing the platform’s capabilities, helping increase revenue, reduce operational costs, and expand market reach through innovative lending solutions.
Through these initiatives, I have contributed to Hyphen’s ability to scale efficiently while ensuring a seamless, high-performing financial platform.
As a Lead Developer at PSP, LLC, I played a key role in modernizing and scaling the company’s internal systems, improving operational efficiency, and driving data-driven decision-making. My contributions ranged from developing automation tools to leading architectural transformations that enhanced system performance and maintainability.
Key Contributions:
- Business Process Automation: Designed and developed an internal tool using CodeIgniter 3, jQuery, and MySQL, significantly reducing manual workload and improving efficiency.
- System Optimization: Migrated the frontend to Vue.js and upgraded the backend to Laravel, enhancing system performance and user experience.
- Scalable Architecture: Led the transition from a monolithic architecture to a microservices-based system, utilizing Vue.js, TypeScript, and Laravel-powered APIs, improving scalability and maintainability.
- Advanced Data Analytics: Built three sophisticated web applications for deep data analysis and reporting, leveraging complex SQL queries to enable strategic business decisions.
This role allowed me to apply and refine my expertise in modern web development, system architecture, and data analytics, directly impacting business efficiency and scalability.
Founded as Kalinko Tech in 2014, now evolved into Kalinko Labs — a digital agency that solves the technical problems others avoid. We help companies automate operations, ship custom software, and turn operational chaos into competitive advantage.
What we do:
- Automation & AI: Build intelligent systems that cut costs and speed up decisions
- Custom Software: High-performance web and mobile applications tailored to client needs
- Engineering Consulting: Senior engineers who integrate fast and transfer knowledge
- Technical Health Checks: Two-week assessments to identify bottlenecks and technical debt
Based in Guinea, working with companies globally.
Chapter 5 Toolkit
Chapter 6 Outside Work
When I'm not building software: trail running in the mountains, paddleboarding before the sun gets too high, reading whatever catches my attention (lately it's been a mix of sci-fi and business history). I'm also constantly exploring new technologies and learning new things — there's always another interesting problem to solve.