About the job

Senior Software Engineer (Backend / Systems Design)

We’re working with a well-established, private equity-backed technology business operating across multiple international markets. The company builds and delivers critical, high-availability systems within sectors that demand reliability, scalability and long-term performance. Following continued growth and system evolution, they are looking to strengthen their engineering team with a senior hire.

This is a senior-level Software Engineer role focused on designing, building and evolving large-scale, high-capacity systems within a complex, distributed environment.

The Role

• Design and build scalable, event-driven and distributed systems
• Translate product requirements into robust technical solutions and architecture
• Contribute across the full development lifecycle: planning, design, implementation and optimisation
• Maintain a balance of ~70% hands-on coding and ~30% architecture, planning and collaboration
• Work closely with Product and Engineering teams to define and refine system requirements
• Ensure high standards across code quality, testing and maintainability
• Support and mentor other engineers, contributing to coding standards and best practices
• Participate in code reviews, technical discussions and continuous improvement initiatives
• Troubleshoot complex issues across the system lifecycle

Tech Environment

• Predominantly PHP, including legacy systems (KPHP) transitioning to Laravel
• Some C# exposure – not essential but beneficial
• Backend-focused, with rare occasional frontend interaction (non-UI heavy systems)
• Event-driven architecture and distributed systems at scale

What They’re Looking For

• Strong fundamentals in software engineering and system design
• Experience building and scaling backend systems in complex environments
• Ability to design for performance, reliability and future scalability
• Comfortable working across legacy and modernising tech stacks
• Experience working with Product teams on requirements and planning
• Solid understanding of coding standards, testing (TDD beneficial), and software quality
• Mentoring or guiding other engineers
• Exposure to distributed systems or high-throughput environments
• Frontend experience is a bonus, not a requirement

Salary & Benefits

• £75,000 base salary
• 5% annual bonus
• Benefits package included

Working Setup

• Hybrid environment with flexibility (typically up to 3 days in office, though this varies in practice and can be less)

Additional Notes

• Strong emphasis on core engineering fundamentals over reliance on tooling such as AI
• Candidates should be pragmatic, collaborative and technically grounded