Micha Mailänder
Founder building product, business & open-source systems
I turn repeated founder and product pain into tools, foundations, and decision systems — from self-hosted auth and design systems to go-to-market clarity and living business planning.
What I build
Across open source, product, design, and leadership.
Open Source
170+
GitHub Stars
14,500+
Downloads last 30 days
Product & Design
6,200+
Figma Users
70
paid customers
Leadership
15
team led
€2.5M
annual budget
I work on two kinds of systems: technical foundations teams can own, and business foundations that help founders make better decisions.
Technical Systems
I build ownable product foundations for teams that want speed without lock-in — from authentication and billing to design system tooling.
Business Systems
Plancreator grew out of the struggle of building Dechea: market fit, go-to-market, hiring, fundraising, and financial logic often live in disconnected documents. I wanted one living model that keeps strategy, numbers, and execution aligned.
170+
GitHub Stars
14,500+
Downloads last 30 days
70
paid customers
6,200+
Figma Users
Svelte adapter for Better Auth on Convex
Svelte adapter for Convex Auth
Production-ready auth & org widgets
The Svelte client for Convex
Subscriptions & billing for Convex
Design system kit for Skeleton & Tailwind
I've always been driven by one simple idea: helping people become creators so they can solve real problems — for themselves, their friends, and their communities.
In 2019 we founded Dechea, a practice management app for dentists. Our first feature was a calendar — and we failed. Coming from backend development, we didn't know CSS well enough to make even a basic layout. Hiring frontend developers didn't fix it either; without understanding the craft ourselves, we couldn't recognize great design work.
So we learned — painfully. We tried UI libraries like Material, Chakra, Mantine… powerful, but they always looked like someone else's product — never truly ours. In the end, we built our own design system. It took months, but it finally gave us visual consistency and confidence.
Then came auth. We needed multi-organization support, privacy, and self-hosting — so we explored everything from Keycloak to Clerk. Some were too complex, others too restrictive or too expensive. Most didn't feel like our brand. And handing off user data to third parties felt wrong.
That realization led to Etesie: self-owned foundations for auth, billing, and design that teams can actually make their own.
But building Dechea exposed another gap as well: founders do not just need better software, they need better clarity. Market fit, go-to-market, financial planning, hiring, and fundraising often live in disconnected spreadsheets, decks, and notes. Plancreator is my answer to that problem — a living business plan that keeps strategy, execution, and numbers aligned.
In January 2026 I became a Convex Champion — and today I maintain five open-source packages that form an important part of the Svelte + Convex ecosystem, from auth adapters and billing to the Svelte client itself.
Building ownable technical foundations for product teams: self-hosted auth, billing integration, the Svelte client for Convex, plus theme tooling and Figma kits used by 6,200+ designers and developers.
Product vision and strategy, open-source ecosystem development, architecture decisions, design system strategy, community engagement
Dec 2024 - Present
Plancreator turns the business plan into a living operating system for founders. It connects strategy, target audience, go-to-market, execution, and financial reality into one consistent model for funding, hiring, and decision-making.
Overall responsibility for vision and product, conception of model and methodology, software development, architecture and technical implementation
May 2024 - Present
Medical software enabling dentists to plan treatments in less than two minutes.
Responsibility for product strategy, software architecture and toolchain, technical leadership, mentoring and development of the engineering team
Aug 2020 - May 2024
Connected Drive – BMW's infotainment system. Billing & Payment team (via doubleSlash).
Leading and steering an agile team of 15 people, ensuring product quality, responsibility for budget and project success (€2.5M annually)
Jan 2019 - Jul 2020
Connected Drive – BMW's infotainment system. Billing & Payment team (via doubleSlash).
Supporting team leadership and coaching of a 15-person team, responsibility for quality assurance and operational execution
Apr 2017 - Dec 2018
Internal and customer-specific software solutions.
Development of a continuous delivery toolchain, building automated tests, creating training documentation, implementing customer-specific requirements
Sep 2016 - Mar 2017
Vocational training in software development.
Development and maintenance of applications, fundamentals of software architecture, collaboration on customer and internal projects
Sep 2013 - Aug 2016
Secondary education with intermediate school certificate.
Until Jul 2013
I’m especially interested in work where product, engineering, and business systems need to come together.
