Boarding passGroup 1 · Priority

Passenger

Lucas Chen

Software Engineer · Zynga AdTech

YYZToronto

YOUYour team

Flight
LC 747
Date
29SEP
Gate
Z7
Seat
20F
Group
1
Status
On time

Software engineer building AI tooling and ad tech at Zynga.

Stub · keep this part

Flight
LC 747
Seat
20F
Group
1
Scan or tap: LinkedIn

RésuméLinkedInGitHub

EXPPassport · entries

Where I've been

6 stamps, newest first: every place Lucas has worked, taught or researched.

  1. Leg 06 · HMI to ZNG

    Software EngineerZynga

    May 2025 – Present · Toronto, ON

    AdTech team: AI tooling and ad projects.

    • Designed and led internal tooling for ad-serving configurations: an MCP (Model Context Protocol) server and tools that let AI assistants work with ad-serving configuration.
    • Worked on an AI LiveOps agent that cut a workflow from 2–3 hours to about 20 minutes.
    • Designed and led a project that helps games identify high-value ads.

  2. Leg 05 · MCU to HMI

    Full Stack Engineering InternHexagon Manufacturing Intelligence

    May 2023 – Jun 2024

    • Developed 15+ UI and 10+ API production features for the Nexus Platform, using React and Express with TypeScript.
    • Reduced load times for user list pages by 97% by optimizing API calls and refining Express APIs.
    • Cut test automation start-up time by up to 98% by parallelizing the Playwright test suite setup.
    • Reduced API response time by up to 82% with an Azure Cosmos DB proxy that moved Express APIs to C# .NET database pagination.

    Declared: TypeScript · React · Express · C# · .NET · Azure Cosmos DB · Playwright

  3. Leg 04 · EXS to MCU

    Teaching AssistantMcMaster University

    Sep 2022 – Apr 2023 · Hamilton, ON

    • 1P13 Integrated Engineering Project (Sep–Dec 2022).
    • 2GA3 Computer Architecture (Jan–Apr 2023).

  4. Leg 03 · MAI to EXS

    Software Engineering InternExchange Solutions

    May 2022 – Aug 2022

    E-commerce and loyalty platforms: a Shopify app on AWS, plus AR, blockchain and data-visualization work.

    • Made e-commerce client onboarding over 10x faster by building AWS Lambda components.
    • Led an augmented reality proof of concept for a national loyalty program, built with 8th Wall WebAR and JavaScript.
    • Raised a loyalty platform’s user engagement by 4% by integrating it with blockchain assets, using Next.js, Ethereum and the Alchemy API.
    • Built a real-time data visualization dashboard (D3.js, Snowflake), improving early error catching and data comparisons by over 10%.

    Declared: AWS Lambda · JavaScript · Next.js · D3.js · Snowflake · 8th Wall WebAR · Shopify API

  5. Leg 02 · IND to MAI

    AI Research MemberMcMaster Artificial Intelligence Society

    Oct 2021 – 2022 · Hamilton, ON

    • Worked with a team of four developers on training a humanoid to walk and navigate obstacles in a ragdoll physics simulation.
    • Used C# and Unity to train and simulate the humanoid.

    Declared: C# · Unity

  6. Leg 01 · YYZ to IND

    Software Engineering InternInsideDesk

    Jun 2021 – Sep 2021

    • Found 50+ bugs through QA testing, validated bug fixes, and was the link between clients and the development team.
    • Cut manual tasks by over 30% with custom JavaScript Slack bots that automate the customer onboarding notifications.
    • Wrote automated end-to-end UI tests with Selenium and Python, cutting manual QA testing by 40%.

    Declared: JavaScript · Python · Selenium · Slack

IMPReceipt · Zynga AdTech

Itemized receipt

What Lucas has shipped at Zynga AdTech, line by line. No totals: only numbers that were actually measured.

Side projects →

ZYNGA · ADTECH

TORONTO, CANADA

29SEP · LC 747CHEN/LUCAS

  1. AD-CONFIG MCPLED

    Designed & led by Lucas Chen

    I designed and led internal tooling for ad-serving configurations at Zynga: a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server and tools that let AI assistants work with ad-serving configuration.

    #AI #MCP #AdTech #Leadership

  2. LIVEOPS AGENT~20 min

    I worked on an AI LiveOps agent that cut a workflow from 2–3 hours to about 20 minutes.

    Before
    2–3 h
    After
    ~20 min
    Time saved
    2–3 h to ~20 min

    Time to complete one LiveOps workflow

    #AIagents #LiveOps #Automation

  3. HIGH-VALUE ADSLED

    Designed & led by Lucas Chen

    I designed and led a project that helps games identify high-value ads.

    #AdTech #Leadership

ITEMS3

PAID WITHCURIOSITY

*** Thank you for flying with Lucas ***

Keep this receipt · Printed in Toronto

PRJPostcards · side projects

Postcards from the trip

Things built along the way: 5 postcards and 5 tagged bags.

  1. Agent Platform

    A control plane for safely delegating software work to autonomous coding agents.

    A harness-agnostic platform for handing software work to coding agents in Cursor, Claude Code or any other harness. The goal, from my spec: maximize architecture-approved, verified engineering output per dollar and per minute of human attention.

    • Wrote the v3 spec: missions, workflow templates, task and role contracts, review gates, model routing, memory and fleet security.
    • Built the “agent” control-plane CLI in TypeScript: it scaffolds a target repo, validates artifacts against JSON Schemas and runs the claim → start → submit → gate loop.

    — LC, Solo: spec, design and CLI (in progress)

    When
    Aug 2026 – present
    Stack
    TypeScript · Node.js · JSON Schema (Ajv) · Commander · YAML

    Travel journal (case study) GitHub

  2. TennisBooker

    Books tennis and pickleball courts the moment booking opens, every morning.

    My parents had to set a 7:30 a.m. alarm every week to get courts at our local club, so I automated it. Members set weekly schedules in a web app, and a bot books the courts each morning and texts the results.

    • The bot logs in at 7:25, builds every reservation, then fires at exactly 7:30 a.m. ET for courts 7 days out, falls back to backup courts and texts results via Twilio.
    • TypeScript monorepo (Turborepo): Express + Prisma/PostgreSQL API with Auth0 roles and machine-to-machine tokens for the bot, and a React, MUI and TanStack Query web app.

    — LC, Solo, full-stack (2023 version with help from Douglas Chen)

    When
    2023 – present
    Stack
    TypeScript · Playwright · React · Express · PostgreSQL · Auth0 · Docker
    With
    Douglas Chen

    Travel journal (case study) GitHub (2023 version)

  3. PlatefulAI

    Mobile meal planner: pick meals, get a grocery list, track calories and protein.

    A mobile-first meal planner: choose meals and servings, turn them into a grocery list, and track calories and protein against personal targets. Our team of five built it as a front-end prototype on mock meal data, so the “AI-powered meal prep” step is a UI concept.

    • Set up the React + Vite app with Auth0 login, the start and home screens and bottom-tab navigation, and deployed it on Vercel.
    • Built the meal-planning flow: favourites, filtering out meals that clash with saved allergies and diets, a meal-details view, and meal and serving selection.

    — LC, Team of 5: app shell, Auth0 login, meal-planning flow, deploy

    When
    Nov – Dec 2024
    Stack
    React · Vite · MUI · Auth0 · Chart.js · Vercel
    With
    Mohammad Mohsin Khan, Wajdan Faheem, Jasmine Sun-Hu, Hammad

    Travel journal (case study) Live demo

  4. CarpoolX

    Android app that matches riders headed the same way so they can share a taxi.

    CarpoolX matches riders heading to the same destination so they can share a taxi and split the fare, with an upfront fare estimate and safety checks for riding with strangers. Four of us built it as a React Native Android app on a Flask and Firebase backend.

    • Led the repo: scaffold, navigation and a feature-branch workflow. Merged all 38 pull requests that landed and wrote 119 of 156 commits.
    • Wrote most of the MVC Flask backend: multi-user Firebase Auth sign-in, tokens kept in the Android Keystore, token-checked endpoints, and the controller and model layers.

    — LC, Team of 4: repo lead, most of the Flask backend and auth, core screens

    When
    Mar – Apr 2023
    Stack
    React Native · Python · Flask · Firebase · Google Maps Platform
    With
    Henushan Bala, Rafeed Iqbal, Allison Cook

    Travel journal (case study) GitHub

  5. Rest Day

    A workout planner that schedules rest days, not just workouts. Built at DeltaHacks 8.

    A weekly workout planner that deliberately schedules rest days, designed to use Fitbit sleep and activity data to decide when to train and when to recover. Willie Pai and I built it in 36 hours at DeltaHacks 8.

    • Wrote the Fitbit Web API client, which pulls 7-day sleep and activity logs and heart-rate data (a standalone Node script, not yet wired into the UI).
    • Built the navigation bar and landing page with styled-components, plus the routes for the other pages.

    — LC, Team of 2: Fitbit API integration, landing page, deploy

    When
    Jan 2022
    Stack
    React · Fitbit Web API · styled-components · Node.js · Figma
    Award
    2nd place, “To Work or Not To Workout” sponsor challenge (AI Endurance), DeltaHacks 8
    With
    Willie Pai

    Travel journal (case study) Devpost GitHub

Also checked in

SKLCustoms · declaration

Anything to declare?

Yes: the tools and skills packed for this trip.

Declaration cardOne card per traveller · please print

1. Full name
Lucas Chen
2. Occupation
Software Engineer, Zynga
3. Residence
Toronto, Canada
4. Flight no.
LC 747

5. Purpose of trip Work (ticked) Building things (ticked) Pleasure only (not ticked)

6. Goods to declare

  • Languages

    • TypeScript
    • JavaScript
    • Python
    • Java
    • C#
    • SQL
    • HTML/CSS
    • Bash

  • Frontend

    • React
    • React Native
    • Next.js
    • Vite
    • MUI
    • TanStack Query

  • Backend & data

    • Node.js
    • Express
    • .NET
    • Flask
    • Prisma
    • PostgreSQL
    • MongoDB
    • Azure Cosmos DB
    • Firebase
    • DynamoDB
    • Swagger

  • AI & agents

    • Model Context Protocol (MCP)
    • Claude Agent SDK
    • Claude Code
    • Cursor

  • Testing & automation

    • Playwright
    • Vitest
    • Jest
    • Selenium

  • Infra & tooling

    • Docker
    • Git
    • GitHub Actions
    • GitLab CI
    • Vercel
    • AWS (Lambda, S3)
    • Auth0
    • Azure DevOps

7. Country of study

McMaster University · B.Eng., Software Engineering (Co-op) · 2020–2025

Dean's Honour List (2020–2023) · McMaster Honour Award (2020–2023) · Courses: System Design, Data Structures and Algorithms, OOP, Software Design, Databases

SignatureLucas Chen

Date29SEP 2026

CNTDepartures · final call

Now boarding: your team

Pick a gate. Lucas reads every message.

  1. LC 747RésuméOne page, printableGate R1Now boarding
  2. LC 748LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/lucasichenGate INOn time
  3. LC 749GitHubgithub.com/lucasichenGate GHOn time
  4. LC 750Résumé.pdfOne page, to downloadGate R2On time
  5. LC 751Résumé.jsonThe résumé as dataGate R3On time
  6. LC 752Another layoutRemix this portfolioGate XOpen

Wish you were here. — Lucas

Why this portfolio?

The Boarding Pass edition: the same facts as every other version, in a different shape.

How each section of this page is drawn
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