About · Ascend Griffin
I'm Taras Smaliukh — an ally for founders in IT. I take your project to a result — from the first idea to something that works.
Why this works
I see the hidden risks in your IT projects and turn complexity into confident decisions — from the first idea to a working result.
I've spent 8 years inside IT — as a business analyst and product lead across AI, logistics, fintech, and online business services. I've sat on both sides of the table: negotiating with contractors, owning what gets built, planning and building teams from scratch.
I started in a field where a mistake is measured in lives, not bad screens — Air Traffic Control. There, unclear requirements don't cause a clunky app; they cause accidents. That discipline stays with me on every project.
For several years I led product and operations at a B2B AI logistics startup — banking, fuel retail, insurance, e-signature. I built the team and the product from zero, secured six-figure development capital, and negotiated agreements with incumbents across regulated sectors.
That experience isn't a line on a CV — it's the reason I understand how IT projects actually behave under pressure. Not from books and not from slides — from practice, where the cost of being wrong is real.
I see what you can't — while it's still cheap to fix. In a contractor's contract I find the clauses that cost you tens of thousands three months in. In negotiations I ask the questions that quietly turn a "confident" quote into an honest one. In an estimate I find the hidden assumptions that grow a $40K project into a $70K one.
You walk into decisions with facts, not with the feeling you might be getting played. And when something breaks, you hear from me not "let me bring in another consultant," but a straight answer: here's what went wrong, and here's the order we fix it in.
I won't write your code. But I make sure the people who do are working toward your result — not toward their hourly invoice.
A short intro call comes first, always — 30 minutes to understand your situation. From there we work in one of three ways: me alongside you as an advisor, full delivery with my trusted team, or research-and-handoff to your own builders. Price is fixed before work starts. No hourly billing.
See the full method and five principles →Over 8 years I've learned to see where risks hide in IT projects. Modern AI tools made that work deeper and faster: a 50-page contractor proposal that once took two days, I now break down in an hour.
For you that means one thing — the kind of expertise that used to be reserved for big companies with their own technical director, you get directly: faster, deeper, and for less money. And you work with me in person, not with an hourly invoice and agency process.
From practice — happens often.
In Cursor or a similar AI tool you've made something that already works. First paying users, a few ideas for later — and a nagging feeling the foundation might not hold. You can't read the code, only prompt the AI. You need someone who'll tell you straight: what's solid here, what will crumble under load, and what it really takes to get this to a reliable launch.
From practice — the most common situation.
Three proposals on the table. Prices from $45K to $120K for what sounds like the same project. One contractor is confident, two are vague, all three are convincing. Without a technical eye it's nearly impossible to tell which price is honest, which is padded, and which grows 40% the moment you ask for a change. I put all three on the same footing — so you see the difference, not the polish.
From practice — early stage.
You've known your field from the inside for years — logistics, finance, healthcare. Knowledge no developer has. What's missing is a clear answer: should this be built at all, what will it really cost, and what has to be true for the product to take off. You get that answer before you spend the first dollar.
From practice — a recovery situation.
The product shipped and mostly works. But progress has slowed to almost nothing, the contractor replies ever slower, the budget drains on "maintenance" with nothing to show — and no one can say why. The first step isn't rebuilding from scratch; it's a calm diagnosis: what broke, when, and why. That's where recovery starts.
So you don't waste time — here's where I'm not your best choice: