Simple Machines is a leading independent boutique technology firm with a global presence, including teams in London, Sydney, San Francisco, and New Zealand. We specialise in creating technology solutions at the intersection of data, AI, machine learning, data engineering, and software engineering. Our mission is to help enterprises, technology companies, and governments better connect with and understand their organisations, their people, their customers, and citizens. We are a team of creative engineers and technologists dedicated to unleashing the potential of data in new and impactful ways. We design and build bespoke data platforms and unique software products, create and deploy intelligent systems, and bring engineering expertise to life by transforming data into actionable insights and tangible outcomes. We engineer data to life™.
The Role:
As aPrincipal Software EngineeratSimple Machines, you’ll be at the heart of groundbreaking projects, collaborating closely with both our talented internal team and forward-thinking clients. In this hands-on role, you'll drive the development of sophisticated, scalable solutions across the full technology stack—from intuitive frontends and robust backends to powerful data pipelines and resilient infrastructure. If you’re passionate about solving complex problems and pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, this role offers the perfect platform for you to make a real impact.
Technical Responsibilities:
- Define and oversee the architecture of complex systems, ensuring scalability, security, and performance.
- Responsible for development of backend services, frontend web user interfaces, data engineering, and infrastructure solutions for a highly scalable marketing platform.
- Responsible for designing the APIs, applications, and infrastructure the team develops, and documenting the technical requirements and design for the client.
- Responsible for end-to-end delivery and support, including build, automation, deployment, and operations, for everything that is developed.
- Partner with client stakeholders, and team members, to gather business requirements, collaborate on design decisions, and translate them into technical and design requirements.
- Operate within an iterative delivery team using Agile delivery tools and practices.
- Hybrid remote and in-person collaboration with the delivery team and client stakeholders.
Consulting Responsibilities:
- Client Advisory:Provide expert advice to clients on optimal data practices that align with their business requirements and project goals.
- Training and Empowerment:Educate client teams on the latest technologies and strategies, enabling them to efficiently utilise and maintain the solutions we have developed.
- Professional Development:Keep up with the latest industry trends and technological advancements, continually upgrading skills and achieving certifications in the technologies Simple Machines implements across its client base.
- Business Alignment: Translate business needs into technical requirements and ensure technical solutions drive business success.
About the team:
Each team member has varying degrees of strength in each area, but all work together across the full stack and assist one another to learn and contribute.
The engineering team enjoys a high degree of autonomy over technical design and actively engages with stakeholders to design solutions. They also actively engage with data scientists and other teams to design and document cross-system solutions.
Requirements
Essential:
- A consultative approach to software development.
- Strong mix of advanced technical skills, leadership abilities, and substantial industry experience.
- Visionary leader who combines deep technical expertise with the ability to influence and inspire a team, driving projects and systems toward long-term success.
- Worked across various projects, technologies, and domains to bring a broad and deep skill set.
- Core foundation in programming, especially in JVM languages (particularly Kotlin or Java).
- Experience designing and implementing data-driven APIs.
- Exposure to frontend development (particularly React.js, Tailwind, REDUX, Typescript)
- Past project experience with large scale webservices.
- Cloud infrastructure experience with AWS and/or Google Cloud, Azure, etc.
- Infrastructure-as-code experience, such as with Terraform or Cloud Formation.
- In-depth experience with unit and integration testing, and test automation generally. Ideally TAA and/or BDD
- Experience working with SQL databases in the context of implementing data-driven APIs, and designing database schemas and queries to meet business requirements.
Desirable:
- A passion and proven background in picking up and adopting new technologies on the fly.
- Backend server experience using Kotlin.
- Exposure to Scala, or functional programming generally.
- Experience with highly concurrent, asynchronous backend technologies, such as Ktor, http4k, http4s, Play, RxJava, etc.
- Experience with DynamoDB or similar NoSQL databases, such as Cassandra, HBase, BigTable, or Cosmos DB.
- Experience with Git workflows, and the ability to tailor the workflow to project needs.
- Experience with containerised application deployment using Docker, Amazon ECS, Kubernetes, etc.
Benefits
What We Offer in the UK:
- Salary: Competitive salary and benefits package.
- Pension: Up to 5% employer contribution, matching up to a 5% employee contribution, for a total of up to 10%.
- Annual Leave: 4 weeks standard + 1 week additional annual leave over Christmas shut down period, plus public holidays.
- Your Day - No Questions Asked: One additional day off per year, no explanation required!
- Regular Lunches: Provided at team meet-ups and on workdays at Simple Machines' co-working space.
- Health and Wellbeing Allowance: £1,250 allowance per year to be used for any food and non-alcoholic beverages during business hours, healthcare, gym memberships, sporting goods and accessories, and any wellness appointments.
- Professional Development: £1,500 annual budget for training, courses, and conferences, with potential for additional funding.
- Certifications: £2,500 annual budget for certifications and related courses.
- Equipment Allowance: £1,500 for UK team members, plus Apple MacBook Pro laptops and necessary accessories.
- Company Sick Leave: 10 days per annum, includes coverage for employee’s family.
- Antenatal Support: Paid time off for antenatal appointments, including classes recommended by health professionals.
- Terminal Illness Benefit: Three months' continuance of salary at full pay.
Join Us:
Simple Machines is a diverse and globally distributed team of individual talents. Everyone in the firm is among the best at what they do. That’s why they’re here. We have a collective obsession with the future and a passion to create real change through technology. If you’re someone who’s as passionate as we are about building a world-class technology company specialising in engineering for data, you’ll fit right in.
