Software Development

Watch: Crossbeam software engineers explain their ‘bet’ on Clojure

"Clojure was instrumental in hiring that first round of programers," an engineering manager said of the Center City company's growth.

Crossbeam engineers Nick McAvoy and Yiannis Nicolaou talking Clojure. (Screenshot)

While you might not have heard of functional programing language Clojure, Center City-based partner ecosystem platform Crossbeam’s engineers call it the company’s “secret sauce.”

Crossbeam Engineering Manager Nick McAvoy (check out his story of coming to engineering) and Software Engineer Yiannis Nicolao talked about the benefits of the language in a Technical.ly Developers Conference session at Philly Tech Week 2021 presented by Comcast.

The open source program makes it easier to build, treats data as a “first-class citizen,” and helps Crossbeam recruit and develop top talent. It also ranks high in RedMonk’s programing languages, McAvoy said. The switch to Clojure came after the company’s Series A two years ago, and amidst doubling the team.

“Clojure was instrumental in hiring that first round of programmers, and a year goes by, the team doubles again, and not everyone we hired had Clojure experience, but it was still a big part of this whole story,” McAvoy said.

Hear more about the team’s decision to switch to Clojure in the full presentation:

Companies: Crossbeam

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