Stephen Umunna - AdTech Executive Portfolio

Notable Clients

Brands I've worked with directly

A cross-section of accounts I've managed, activated, or built measurement for - across regulated industries, Fortune 500 brands, national franchises, and political campaigns.

CDC

Public Health

Hertz

Travel / Mobility

Grammarly

SaaS

Orangetheory

Fitness

Primo Water

CPG / Beverage

AAA · Direct Auto

Insurance

PMI Colombia

Regulated CPG

Thomas J. Henry

Legal

Party City

Retail

Floor & Decor

Home Improvement

National Political Campaigns

Political

and many more

Confidential AdTech Startup

CTO / Acting COO · Apr 2025 – Mar 2026

Two-sided AdTech platform - consumer ordering + advertiser activation, built end-to-end. 15-person startup, $3.6M-6M ARR. I hired every team member, built the technology, ran the P&L, and grew the client base from zero to 200+ simultaneous accounts. 85% client retention with zero long-term contracts.

Consumer Side

Built and scaled the consumer ordering platform from 2,000 to 200,000 monthly users in 11 months. 100x growth, end-to-end.

Advertiser Side · Customer Data Platform

CDP behind 200+ advertiser accounts: 21M+ unique consumer profiles, 1B+ behavioral data points, 6 DSP integrations - including activation by a major DSP partner for pharmaceutical advertiser campaigns.

Platform architecture → CDP deep dive → Shoppable ad engine → Consumer app → Growth engineering →

Causal IQ

Sr. Account Ops Manager · Jun 2019 – Mar 2025

Programmatic advertising platform (~125 employees). Top 2 in profitability out of 22. Managed up to $900K/month in ad spend across 10+ DSPs. Built tools that elevated the entire organization - not just my own performance. Contributed to a multimillion-dollar exclusivity deal.

Brand-Direct Programmatic

Direct programmatic work with major advertisers across CPG, automotive, healthcare, fitness, retail, legal, regulated CPG, and political verticals.

CTV Measurement Framework

Built a CTV measurement framework for Thomas J. Henry that surfaced a 5-7 day reduced time-to-signup when CTV was layered with Display. Codebase handed off to Causal IQ at departure.

CTV measurement deep dive →

Explore the full Causal IQ story →

Python Automation case study - 60x faster reporting, department-wide adoption

Python Automation SuiteCompany-Wide

Adopted by the Operations & Analytics department · Department-wide standard

4 Python/Pandas tools I built on my own: bid optimization, audience insights, site list management, and campaign reporting. Automated workflows across TTD and DV360. Made the whole team 60x faster.

View Case Study →

Top 2 of 22

Top 2 in profitability · up to $900K/mo

Campaign Performance & Scaleup to $900K/mo

10+ DSPs · TTD · DV360 · Yahoo · Zeta

Managed up to $900K/month in programmatic spend across 10+ DSPs (The Trade Desk, DV360, Yahoo, Zeta, and more). Consistently ranked top 2 in profitability out of 22 account managers. Contributed to a multimillion-dollar exclusivity deal with a key data partner.

AI Engineering

Daily practice, production output

AI fluency isn't a resume line - it's the operating layer. Three uses, each producing something concrete.

Daily Engineering

Coding co-pilots

Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, and Copilot in rotation. Used to build the entire 950K-line Confidential AdTech Startup platform and every project in the R&D lab.

Claude Code Codex Cursor Copilot

Production AI

User-facing AI features

Vercel AI SDK + Gemini powering the Stanford BIOE 230 contextual tutor. Real users, real prompts, real evaluation.

Vercel AI SDK Gemini Streaming UI

Agentic Workflows

MCP-based automation

MCP-driven sales prospecting workflows at Confidential AdTech Startup - automated account enrichment, outreach generation, and pipeline triage.

MCP Agentic Tools Pipeline Automation

Adoption & Recognition

Defensible social proof

Verifiable adoption, codebase continuity, account growth, and team performance signals from the work itself - not paraphrased praise.

Stanford University Adopted

“Adopted Stephen’s BIOE 230 Interactive Platform for the Spring 2026 semester.”

Stanford Bioengineering Department
Professor Todd P. Coleman · Department-wide rollout in progress

Causal IQ Codebase Continuity

“The CTV measurement framework Stephen built remained in use at Causal IQ after his departure, continuing to serve the broader client book.”

Causal IQ engineering team
Continuity statement · March 2025

Causal IQ · Client Growth 25x · +$500K

Floor & Decor. Grew programmatic ad spend from ~$10K to $250K monthly (25x) by pitching strategic media recommendations layered with native and display.

Thomas J. Henry. Expanded their CTV budget by stacking CTV under display - justified through a custom CTV measurement framework I built that cut time-to-signup 5-7 days.

Account growth proof points · verifiable spend trajectories

Causal IQ Top 2 of 22

“Ranked top 2 in profitability across the 22-person Account Operations team for performance discipline, optimization judgment, and client communication.”

22-person Account Operations team
Performance recognition · 2019–2025

Confidential AdTech Startup Team-Wide Operating Standard

“Made AI-assisted development the team-wide operating standard across engineering and operations - daily Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, and Copilot use by every team member. The team multiplier mattered more than any individual prompt skill.”

15-person team, engineering + operations · Apr 2025–Mar 2026

Direct recommendations from past managers, clients, and colleagues available upon request. LinkedIn recommendations at linkedin.com/in/stephenumunna.

Career Arc

Apr 2025 – Mar 2026

Confidential AdTech Startup

CTO / Acting COO. Hired and led 15 people across engineering, ad ops, sales, and data entry. Architected the platform. Owned the P&L. 85% client retention.

Jun 2019 – Mar 2025

Causal IQ

Promoted from Account Operations Manager. Top 2 in profitability out of 22. Managed up to $900K/mo across 10+ DSPs. Built tools adopted department-wide. Contributed to a multimillion-dollar exclusivity deal.

Mar 2015 – Nov 2018 (concurrent with RE/MAX)

DoveMed

Dir. of Operations (NA). Led 10-person engineering team. Grew from 2K to 500K MAU in 14 months. Zero paid marketing.

Sep 2014 – Jun 2019

RE/MAX

Dir. of Research & Technology. Python automation for 120 agents. Where I first learned to replace manual work with code.

R&D LAB

Technical proving grounds where I stress-test architecture patterns before applying them to production work. Healthcare data, finance, sports analytics, education - each one pushed a different skill that made the next company better.