Devlyn AI · Dedicated Developer
One senior engineer, embedded in your team, shipping from day one.
A Dedicated Developer engagement places a single senior engineer directly into your engineering team — your Slack channels, your standup cadence, your GitHub repos, your code conventions. The engineer is not a contractor working from a vendor backlog. They are embedded: assigned to your roadmap, reviewing PRs against your style guide, and shipping code that passes your CI/CD pipeline.
What this model delivers
A Dedicated Developer engagement places a single senior engineer directly into your engineering team — your Slack channels, your standup cadence, your GitHub repos, your code conventions. The engineer is not a contractor working from a vendor backlog. They are embedded: assigned to your roadmap, reviewing PRs against your style guide, and shipping code that passes your CI/CD pipeline. The AI-augmented workflow compresses 100 hours of historical output into 25, meaning one Devlyn engineer delivers the throughput of a traditional two-person hire at a fraction of the loaded cost.
Engagement details
Ideal for
Dedicated Developer engagements fit best when your in-house team has clear architectural direction and PM coverage but needs additional senior-level throughput to hit quarterly milestones. Common scenarios include a Series B team that needs to ship an enterprise feature set before the next board meeting, a CTO who lost a senior engineer mid-quarter and needs a replacement productive within days rather than months, or a platform team that needs a specialist in a specific stack for a time-bounded initiative without committing to a permanent headcount increase.
Team composition
One senior engineer with 5+ years of production experience in the target stack, embedded full-time in your team's workflow. The engineer has access to Devlyn's internal AI-augmented toolchain (Cursor, Claude Code, internal scaffolding automation) and senior architectural review from the Devlyn practice leadership when needed. DevOps, QA, and PM responsibilities remain with your in-house team — the Dedicated Developer focuses purely on engineering throughput within your existing operational structure.
Pricing
Hourly engagements start at $15/hour for initial fit testing. Monthly retainers start at $2,500/month for a single embedded engineer, which includes full-time allocation, AI-augmented toolchain access, and the 14-day replacement guarantee. The retainer model runs 40–60% below the loaded cost of a comparable metro FTE when you factor in benefits, equity, recruiter fees, onboarding time, and the 4–6-month hiring pipeline that the retainer eliminates entirely.
Why this model
The Dedicated Developer model eliminates the three costs that make FTE hiring expensive: the 4–6-month pipeline (replaced by 5–7-day ramp), the recruiter fee (eliminated by the retainer model), and the ramp-up productivity gap (compressed by AI-augmented workflows that deliver production output from week one). The 14-day replacement guarantee removes the risk that makes freelance marketplaces unpredictable.
Compliance ownership
In a Dedicated Developer engagement, compliance and security review ownership remains with your in-house team. The embedded engineer follows your security practices, passes your code-review standards, and ships through your CI/CD pipeline. Devlyn provides senior architectural guidance on request, but the compliance posture is your team's responsibility — the engineer is an embedded contributor, not an autonomous pod.
Scale path
Dedicated Developer engagements scale in two directions. Horizontally: add a second or third embedded engineer as the roadmap grows, each under the same retainer structure with no new SOW. Vertically: upgrade to an Engineering Pod engagement when the work shape shifts from 'more throughput on an existing team' to 'own this entire lane end-to-end including architecture, DevOps, and QA.' The transition is a retainer adjustment, not a new vendor onboarding cycle.
Timeline
Discovery call to deployed engineer: 5–7 days. The 3-day free trial runs against a real task from your backlog, proving fit before any financial commitment. The engineer is productive in your repo within 24 hours of greenlight. If the fit is not right within 14 calendar days, the replacement engineer ramps in 24 hours from Devlyn's 150+ engineer practice — no re-sourcing cycle, no downtime.
Real outcomes
Calenso · Switzerland
4× productivity
5,000+ integrations after AI-augmented engineering.
Creator.ai
6 weeks → 1 week
6× faster delivery, 50% leaner team.
Klaviss · USA
$4,800/mo pod
Real-estate platform overhaul shipped in 8 weeks.
Haxi.ai · Middle East
AI at scale
Spec to production by one pod.
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Top verticals
Other engagement models
Questions about Dedicated Developer
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How fast can a Dedicated Developer engagement start?
Discovery call to deployed engineer: 5–7 days. The 3-day free trial runs against a real task from your backlog, proving fit before any financial commitment. The engineer is productive in your repo within 24 hours of greenlight. If the fit is not right within 14 calendar days, the replacement engineer ramps in 24 hours from Devlyn's 150+ engineer practice — no re-sourcing cycle, no downtime.
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What does a Dedicated Developer engagement cost?
Hourly engagements start at $15/hour for initial fit testing. Monthly retainers start at $2,500/month for a single embedded engineer, which includes full-time allocation, AI-augmented toolchain access, and the 14-day replacement guarantee. The retainer model runs 40–60% below the loaded cost of a comparable metro FTE when you factor in benefits, equity, recruiter fees, onboarding time, and the 4–6-month hiring pipeline that the retainer eliminates entirely.
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Who owns compliance in a Dedicated Developer engagement?
In a Dedicated Developer engagement, compliance and security review ownership remains with your in-house team. The embedded engineer follows your security practices, passes your code-review standards, and ships through your CI/CD pipeline. Devlyn provides senior architectural guidance on request, but the compliance posture is your team's responsibility — the engineer is an embedded contributor, not an autonomous pod.
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How does a Dedicated Developer engagement scale?
Dedicated Developer engagements scale in two directions. Horizontally: add a second or third embedded engineer as the roadmap grows, each under the same retainer structure with no new SOW. Vertically: upgrade to an Engineering Pod engagement when the work shape shifts from 'more throughput on an existing team' to 'own this entire lane end-to-end including architecture, DevOps, and QA.' The transition is a retainer adjustment, not a new vendor onboarding cycle.
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What makes Devlyn's Dedicated Developer model different?
The Dedicated Developer model eliminates the three costs that make FTE hiring expensive: the 4–6-month pipeline (replaced by 5–7-day ramp), the recruiter fee (eliminated by the retainer model), and the ramp-up productivity gap (compressed by AI-augmented workflows that deliver production output from week one). The 14-day replacement guarantee removes the risk that makes freelance marketplaces unpredictable.
Ready to scope
Book a 30-minute discovery call. We will scope whether a Dedicated Developer engagement is the right shape for your roadmap — and if not, we will recommend the model that is.