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Lead Java Software Engineer
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🚀 Lead Java Software Developer | Sports Betting Hedge Fund Startup | London
Please note: this role cannot provide sponsorship. Applicants must have existing right to work.
We’re hiring a hands-on Lead Java Backend Engineer to take technical ownership of critical parts of a fast-moving platform powered by live and historical sports data. This is not a management role, it's 90% hands-on role. You’ll be designing, debugging, coding, reviewing and making the technical calls that keep important systems running. You’ll work alongside experienced quants, traders and developers, owning everything from low-latency data and execution systems to model deployment, risk, simulation and observability.
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What you’ll be doing
- Lead the technical direction of key backend systems
- Build and ship production Java services
- Solve complex problems around distributed systems, asynchronous processing and state
- Own reliability, correctness and production performance
- Raise engineering standards through code reviews and technical leadership
- Take ambiguous problems and drive them from idea → solution → production
What we’re looking for
- 8-15 years commercial Java experience
- Senior/Lead-level backend engineering experience
- Strong Spring Boot and PostgreSQL/SQL skills
- Experience operating production systems where reliability really matters
- Strong debugging and problem-solving ability
- High agency — you see a problem and take ownership
- Comfortable in a small, highly autonomous engineering team
- Hands-on mindset — you still want to code
- Comfortable making extensive use of modern AI coding tools
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Tech you'll encounter
- Java 21
- Spring Boot
- PostgreSQL
- AWS SQS/SNS
- WebSockets
- Bazel
- Docker
- Testcontainers
- Prometheus
- OpenTelemetry
- Sentry
You don't need to know everything on the list. Strong engineering fundamentals and the ability to learn matter more.
If you're a senior/lead Java engineer who wants real ownership, interesting technical problems and the freedom to build, I'd love to hear from you.
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