Joshua Cornutt
Former CTO of ORock Technologies. FedRAMP High, DoD IL4, 99.99% uptime.
Two decades architecting compliant, high-performance cloud and SaaS infrastructure at federal scale. Founder of Open Edge Cloud and Joscor. I now partner with a small number of founders to take their products production-grade, and I bet on the ones who will close their next round.
20 years in cloud and infrastructure | Tech due-diligence lead on an $80M raise | 30-person technology org led | 99.99% uptime SLA | 4 FedRAMP audits passed | FIPS 140-2 and 140-3 validated
Work with me
I offer three ways to work together: build-for-equity incubation, fractional CTO and advisory, and cloud infrastructure consulting through Joscor. Every one holds the same standard. I do not ship anything I would not run in my own production.
Build-for-equity incubation
I take idea-stage and MVP-stage products to production-grade in exchange for equity. The build is bounded and milestone-vested, and I work as a real co-investor in the outcome. I take only two or three at a time, and I pick founders, not products. If you can raise your next round, my equity has a path to liquidity.
Fractional CTO and advisory
I provide senior architecture and engineering leadership on retainer, for founders who need a CTO-grade partner through a build, a raise, or a scale event without a full-time hire. This includes technical due-diligence support and investor-meeting preparation.
Cloud consulting (Joscor)
I deliver production-hardened OpenStack, OpenShift, and Kubernetes platforms, SaaS scale-up, and compliance and high-performance networking through my consulting practice, Joscor.
Track record
I have spent my career on the hard end of infrastructure, the environments where downtime is a headline and an audit failure ends a contract.
As CTO of ORock Technologies from 2021 to 2025, I led a 30-person technology organization delivering FedRAMP Moderate and FedRAMP High cloud platforms (DoD IL2 and IL4 by reciprocity) on OpenStack and Ceph: 100GbE spine-leaf fabrics, NVIDIA and Mellanox smart NICs, SafeNet Luna HSMs at FIPS 140-2 Level 3. We held a 99.99% uptime SLA against strict federal compliance obligations and passed four FedRAMP audits working directly with our PMO and our 3PAO. The FedRAMP High and IL4 environment I built went on to host the US Army’s DRUID program, the cloud DevSecOps pipeline that ships defensive cyber tools to soldiers. I also led the technical due-diligence process behind the company’s $80M raise, and I owned our technology and go-to-market partnerships.
That due-diligence seat is why I built the incubation program. I have watched, up close, which founders raise and which ones spin, and I know what a technical diligence team digs for, because I have run that process from the inside.
The founder instinct came first. At 20 I raised angel funding to build DiNS, a drop-in network operating system that filtered peer-to-peer traffic at line rate. In 2010 I started a computer-repair and SMB technology company in Vermont and sold it two years later. So I have raised money as a founder and I have sat across the table from diligence teams as a CTO, which are the two sides of the exact table the founders I back are standing at.
Ventures
I have founded and I operate two companies today: Open Edge Cloud and Joscor. I built both, and I run both.
Open Edge Cloud
Managed OpenStack with FIPS 140-3 validation on US-based infrastructure. I founded it in 2024. It runs out of Iron Mountain, Virginia, with a second region landing in 2026. Enterprise-grade cloud without hyperscaler lock-in.
Joscor
My independent cloud consulting practice, founded in 2013 and scaled past $1M ARR. Architecture reviews, production platform builds, SaaS scale-up, and fractional cloud-architect retainers for SaaS companies, enterprises, and the public sector.
Building something that has to survive its next 10x?
If you are a founder who can raise, let’s talk about taking your product production-grade.