We are seeking a highly skilled Principal Backend Engineer to join our client’s growing team in London. This is a pivotal, hands-on role at the heart of the engineering organization — shaping architecture, driving technical strategy, and mentoring a talented team of developers. You will ensure the platform meets ambitious goals for scale, performance, and security, while upholding the highest standards of engineering excellence. You won’t just write code — you’ll influence the technical vision, guide major architectural decisions, and help build the foundation for the company’s next phase of growth.
Details:
Location: London, UK (Hybrid – 2–3 days per week in the office)
Employment Type: Full-Time, Permanent
Start Date: ASAP
Language Requirements: Fluent English
Key Responsibilities:
- Architect & Design: Lead the design and architecture of distributed, cloud-native systems that are scalable, resilient, and maintainable.
- Technical Strategy: Partner with engineering leadership to define and implement the long-term technical roadmap.
- Problem Solving: Address complex challenges in performance, scalability, operations, and data processing for high-throughput systems.
- Mentorship: Guide and support engineers through code reviews, design sessions, and technical coaching.
- Best Practices: Promote engineering excellence through high standards in coding, testing, security, and cloud architecture.
- Hands-On Development: Actively contribute production-quality code for critical components and infrastructure projects.
Requirements:
- 10+ years of experience in software engineering, building and delivering large-scale distributed systems in a high-growth environment.
- Advanced proficiency in Java and modern frameworks such as Spring Boot.
- Strong experience with relational databases (PostgreSQL, MSSQL), including data modeling and query optimization.
- Hands-on experience with Apache Kafka and event-driven architectures.
- Deep understanding of cloud platforms, ideally AWS (ECS/Fargate, S3, RDS).
- Strategic and analytical mindset, capable of translating business needs into technical execution.
- Excellent communication and leadership skills with experience mentoring engineering teams.
Nice to Have:
- Experience in the Fintech or financial services sector.
- Proven ability to resolve complex scalability and performance challenges in fast-growing environments.