Rodrigo Almeida

Who they are

Rodrigo Almeida is a Software Engineer / AI at Fraunhofer HHI in Berlin — started his first company in Brazil at 17 after legally emancipating himself, and later co-founded 011House, an Estonian e-Residency company advising entrepreneurs on international expansion.

Person

Rodrigo's career is a long arc from teenage entrepreneur in Brazil to AI engineer at a German research institute. He got a tourism guide certification at Senac RJ in 1998, then studied Graphic Design Digital at INFNET Rio de Janeiro through 2014, and later passed through Wageningen University — an unusual combination that hints at broad intellectual restlessness. He founded his first company in Brazil at 17, after legally emancipating himself from his parents to do it; he later started Criamundi Studio (digital graphic design, 2009), R.A.B. Projetos Técnicos (earthworks, paving, structural calculations, and 3D rendering), and MR Projetar Construção (construction). The pivot toward tech and eventually AI engineering is a sharp one — and 011House, his Estonian e-Residency company offering integrated communication services and advising entrepreneurs on international expansion, sits somewhere between his entrepreneurial past and his current European base. Now based in Berlin, he works as a Software Engineer focused on AI at Fraunhofer HHI, with a stated interest in remote sensing and making satellite imagery more accessible through open-source geospatial data infrastructure. Possibly — the thread connecting all of it is a taste for building systems from scratch, whether a construction firm, a design studio, or open-source geospatial tooling. He keeps a site at rodrigoalmeida.info.

How they likely show up

  • Founded first company at age 17 after legally emancipating himself → high agency; doesn't wait for permission or conventional sequencing.
  • Career spans tourism, graphic design, construction, communication services, and now AI engineering → comfort operating outside a single domain, likely adapts faster than specialists but may go broad rather than deep in early conversations.
  • Runs 011House as a fully remote Estonian e-Residency company while living in Berlin → operationally self-sufficient, accustomed to async and cross-border work.
  • Stated interest in open-source geospatial data infrastructure and remote sensing → gravitates toward public-good or commons-oriented technical problems, not just commercial applications.
  • Possibly — the shift from multiple founder roles to an employed research-engineering position at Fraunhofer HHI suggests a deliberate choice to go deep on a specific technical problem rather than keep spinning up ventures.

Conversation tips

  • → Lead with the geospatial / satellite imagery angle — it's his stated technical passion and will signal you read beyond his job title.
  • → Ask about the e-Residency path and 011House; it's an unusual operational choice and he's been featured on Estonia's own blog about it, so he's happy to talk through it.
  • → Reference his early founding story (age 17, legal emancipation) — it's clearly formative and he's shared it publicly, so it's fair ground and shows genuine preparation.
  • → Don't treat him as a pure academic researcher — his background is heavily founder-operator, and he'll engage more if you acknowledge the building instinct alongside the research context.

Toolbox

Openers

  • Open on 011House and the Estonian e-Residency setup — he built a fully remote European company to coordinate teams internationally, a deliberate structural bet worth unpacking.
  • Mention the open-source geospatial data infrastructure interest — it's specific enough that referencing it shows you read his LinkedIn profile carefully, not just his job title.
  • Note the founding-at-17 detail from the Estonia e-Residency blog — it's the origin story he's chosen to tell publicly and frames everything that follows in his career.

Discovery questions

  1. What drew you from running your own companies across construction and design to research engineering at Fraunhofer HHI — was there a specific problem that pulled you in?
  2. How does the open-source geospatial work connect to what you're doing on the AI side at Fraunhofer HHI — are those threads converging?
  3. 011House is set up to advise entrepreneurs on international expansion — what's the most common mistake you see founders make when they try to go cross-border from Brazil into Europe?

Avoid

Don't assume a linear tech career — he came up through graphic design, construction, and entrepreneurship before landing in AI engineering, and flattening that into a standard software background will lose him immediately.

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Sources

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Generated by briefthecall.com from public web sources on September 12, 2026. Each claim is linked to its source above.

Automatically generated by AI from public sources. May be inaccurate or out of date. Remove or correct this profile →