David Hellmer

01 IntroductionDallas–Fort Worth, TexasNow: October 2026

David
Hellmer

Engineer. DJ. Builder of businesses.

For more than twenty years I've made systems behave: building controls in laboratories, data centers and an FAA control center; a freeze-dried food company built to national distribution; and DJ booths for most of that time. Now I build software with AI agents, held to the rule I learned in the Navy's nuclear program: nothing works until you have watched it work.

David Hellmer seated on the edge of a stone fountain in a hotel courtyard, wearing a light check blazer and a dark shirt, looking off to the side.
Photographed November 2025

What I'm doing now.

  • Engineering Senior applications engineer, building automation

    Design-build and plan/spec BAS engineering, plus internal software and training for the engineering team.

  • Building Software of my own, with AI agents

    Silo, Stratum DSP and Writwall under HLLMR Ventures, held to the rule that nothing is done until it has been seen working.

  • Music Still DJing

    Thirty years on, and an events venture of its own is in the idea stage.

  • This site Becoming a public record

    Story, projects and an archive, added chapter by chapter.

As of

Navy, buildings, businesses, software.

  1. 1998–2000 U.S. Navy nuclear power training

    Where you assume nothing works until you have watched it work.

  2. 2004–2017 Building automation and low-voltage systems

    From security and fire installs to leading a building automation division: SCIFs, government data centers, hospitals, airports and an FAA control center.

  3. 2007–2025 Businesses built and run

    An event-services company, a consultancy, a freeze-dried food manufacturer with national distribution and a team of twelve, and a stretch behind the wheel of a truck.

  4. 2025– Building systems, software and applied AI

    Senior applications engineering in BAS, internal software for engineering teams, and HLLMR Ventures.

The full experience

What I'm building.

All projects

What I've written.

  • Essay Document control for AI-assisted development

    Twenty years of construction document control, mapped onto building software with AI agents: witnessed tests over accepted claims, plan versus as-built, reasoning as the asset, and a corpus that sheds superseded revisions.

    hllmr.com
All writing