[Hiring] Principal Engineer @Masabi

Role Description

We’re looking for a Principal Engineer to join Masabi’s Architecture team. This is a senior role for someone who combines deep technical expertise with strong judgement and the ability to operate across teams. You’ll help shape the technical direction of Masabi’s platform while staying close enough to the detail to design, review and deliver meaningful technical work.

Working across the engineering organisation, you’ll act as a senior technical leader:

• Defining and evolving architecture
• Guiding complex decisions
• Contributing hands-on where it matters most

The role suits someone who can move between system-level thinking and implementation, understands trade-offs, can navigate ambiguity, and helps turn complex or loosely defined problems into clear, practical technical approaches.

Responsibilities

• Shape Masabi’s platform architecture, including platform blueprint definition, standards and best practices
• Design and deliver scalable, robust, cost efficient services aligned with platform blueprint
• Stay hands-on in code and technical delivery, including reviews and targeted contributions
• Identify and work through complex platform challenges related to scalability, performance, resilience and cost
• Act as a senior technical advisor across engineering teams, supporting and influencing technical decisions and ensuring Masabi standards are followed
• Shape and contribute to technical roadmap planning and prioritisation of platform improvements
• Support RFP estimation and technical scoping for complex initiatives
• Produce clear, high-quality technical documentation and architecture artefacts
• Improve how architecture is understood and applied across engineering and the wider business
• Contribute to and help shape technical forums and working groups, including areas such as API and architecture governance

Qualifications

• Strong experience designing and evolving distributed systems and microservices architectures
• Operated at Principal or Staff level, shaping technical direction across multiple teams or domains
• Comfortable staying hands-on, contributing in code, design and delivery when needed
• Strong experience with cloud platforms (AWS preferred) and modern infrastructure practices
• Worked on systems where scale, reliability, performance and cost trade-offs matter
• Proven experience in data architecture (e.g. data platforms, pipelines, warehousing or data lakes)
• Ability to take loosely defined (early stage) business or technical problems and turn them into clear, actionable technical approaches
• Communicate complex ideas clearly and effectively
• Produced structured documentation that helps both technical and non-technical audiences make decisions
• Contributed to engineering standards, architecture patterns or platform direction
• Interest in or exposure to AI-enabled systems, particularly understanding architectural implications in production

Nice To Have

• Experience with REST API design in complex, multi-service environments
• Experience breaking monolithic applications into microservices architectures
• Experience with event-driven architectures (e.g. Kafka, schema governance)
• Experience improving cloud cost and system efficiency at scale
• Familiarity with a range of tools and technologies including:
• Development: Kotlin, Java
• Data storage: DynamoDB, MySQL
• Infrastructure as code and CI/CD: Terraform, GitLab CI/CD

Benefits

• 25 days of holiday per year plus the option to buy another 5 days pro-rated
• Private Healthcare via AXA, including pre-existing conditions and mental health
• Life Insurance
• Menopause support
• Choice of workstation
• Ability to work for up to 3 months per year from any country in the world (certain limitations)
• Pension scheme
• Training allowance of up to £1000 per year
• £200 annual allowance for any home office need or improvement
• Enhanced family leave pay
• Cycle to work scheme
• Regular social gatherings with a monthly allowance for each employee
• Fun and collaborative environment with a focus on making a difference in the world