Lead Software Architect

Shape the architecture behind an international B2B marketplace Location: Remote, UK-based, with occasional travel to meet the senior team in the UK or Germany Working hours: UK working hours, with reasonable flexibility for planned international meetings Reports to: Chief Product OfficerWe’re looking for an experienced Lead Software Architect to take technical ownership of the architecture and continued productisation of SteelBuy, our secure B2B marketplace connecting buyers and sellers of metal.SteelBuy is part of tk accelis Trading, formerly thyssenkrupp Materials Trading, combining the agility of a developing digital platform with the industry expertise and international reach of an established global materials trading organisation.Our immediate commercial and operational focus is the US market, but our ambitions go further. We want to develop SteelBuy into a scalable and adaptable technical product that can support different markets, business models and integrations in the future, potentially including Europe. This is an opportunity to have a significant influence on that journey.Key Responsibilities As Lead Software Architect, you’ll provide the technical vision and architectural direction for the platform while remaining close enough to the technology to make pragmatic, informed decisions.You’ll lead and mentor our back-end engineering team based in India, collaborate with colleagues and stakeholders across the UK, Europe and US, and help establish the technical standards and ways of working that enable us to build a secure, scalable and high-quality product.The role will cover back-end architecture, microservices, DevOps, enterprise integrations, APIs and distributed systems, alongside providing technical leadership to our internal development teams and external partners. Although you'll occasionally work across international time zones, the role operates primarily around UK working hours. Routine alignment to US hours isn't expected.What you’ll be doing Own and evolve the overall software and systems architecture for SteelBuy, ensuring the platform is scalable, secure, maintainable and adaptable. Help transform the platform from a primarily US-focused implementation into a reusable technical product capable of supporting future markets and business models. Translate business and system requirements into clear high-level technical designs, architecture and documentation. Define functional and non-functional technical requirements and help shape the engineering backlog. Lead architectural decisions covering technology, development approaches, workflows, integration patterns and coding standards. Provide technical leadership, coaching and mentoring to developers and engineers. Oversee development to ensure solutions remain aligned with agreed architecture and design principles. Establish and promote engineering best practice across areas including Agile delivery, test-driven development, automated testing and continuous integration. Design effective REST APIs and microservices-based solutions. Support the architecture of enterprise and ERP integrations. Evaluate existing tools, frameworks and development approaches, identifying opportunities to improve quality and efficiency. Remain technically engaged, contributing to solutions and code where your expertise can add value. Support effective CI/CD and DevOps practices. Collaborate with product, engineering and business stakeholders across multiple countries and time zones. Clearly communicate technical concepts, decisions and trade-offs to both technical and non-technical audiences. Help create a culture focused on technical excellence, continuous improvement and learning. Skills, Knowledge and Expertise We’re interested in people who combine strong architectural expertise with a practical, product-focused approach.You’ll ideally bring: Significant experience within software engineering, including experience designing software or systems architecture. Strong experience with Java and Spring Boot andKotlin. Experience designing microservices and distributed architectures. Good knowledge of REST API design and system integration. Experience working with eCommerce, marketplace or comparable digital platform architectures. Strong understanding of object-oriented analysis, design principles and common design patterns. Good knowledge of relational databases, SQL and database schema design. Experience with ORM technologies such as JPA/Hibernate or equivalent. A strong understanding of automated testing, unit testing and test-driven development. Experience with Git, CI/CD and DevOps practices. The ability to turn complex business and technical requirements into clear architecture and technical direction. Experience providing technical leadership, coaching or mentoring to engineering teams. Experience working successfully with internationally distributed teams. Experience in some of the following would be beneficial, but you don’t need to tick every box: