Software Engineer

Software Engineer

Ship code for institutional digital assets — and own the infrastructure it runs on

Location

London / Hybrid (UK-based)

Reports to

CTO

Team size

~15 (technology function within a company of ~50)

Contract

Permanent, full-time

Salary

Competitive + benefits (dependent on experience)

About Archax

Archax is an FCA-regulated digital asset exchange, broker, and custodian serving institutional and professional investors. We’re building the infrastructure that connects traditional finance with digital assets — tokenised securities, crypto custody, and institutional-grade trading.

We’re a small team that punches well above our weight. Our technology stack is modern (TypeScript, Kotlin, Rust), our infrastructure runs on AWS, and we use AI tooling (including Claude) as a core part of how we build software. If you’ve ever wanted to work somewhere your code ships fast and your contributions are immediately visible, this is it.

The Role

This is primarily a software engineering role. You’ll spend the majority of your time writing code — building services, internal tools, integrations, and automation across a TypeScript/Kotlin/Rust monorepo. You’ll work with AI coding assistants daily and be expected to ship production-quality software.

But Archax is a small company, and in a technology team of fifteen there’s no room to hide behind a narrow job title. You’ll also be the person who keeps the corporate technology estate running smoothly — M365 administration, laptop builds, user support, and the occasional helpdesk ticket. Think of it as 70% engineering, 30% IT operations and support. The engineering is the job; the IT is the responsibility that comes with a company this size.

You’ll report directly to the CTO and have genuine ownership across both domains.

Engineering (the core of the role):

• Build and maintain microservices, APIs, and internal tooling in TypeScript/Kotlin, working with AI coding assistants (Claude Code)

• Contribute to the Archax Management Platform (AMP) — a greenfield monorepo covering trading, custody, settlement, operations and compliance

• Maintain and extend CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions), container infrastructure (ECS), and deployment automation

• Manage AWS infrastructure — ECS, RDS, S3, IAM, networking, and cost optimisation

• Work with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform) to provision and manage cloud resources

• Contribute to observability tooling (Grafana, Prometheus, OpenTelemetry) and production reliability

• Support compliance and security engineering requirements appropriate to an FCA-regulated firm

IT operations and support (the other hat):

• Configure and harden Microsoft 365 / Entra ID (Conditional Access, MFA, geo-blocking, DLP policies)

• Image and deploy Windows 11 laptops with security baselines, BitLocker, and endpoint protection

• Triage and resolve helpdesk tickets from a company of ~50 people

• Manage DNS, networking, Cloudflare, VPN/ZTNA, and related connectivity infrastructure

• Contribute to documentation, runbooks, and disaster recovery planning

What We’re Looking ForMust Have

• Strong software development experience — you write clean, testable code and understand how production systems are built, deployed, and maintained

• Proficiency in TypeScript or a comparable modern language (Kotlin, Go, Rust) — this is not a scripting-on-the-side role; you’ll be building services

• Experience with cloud infrastructure (AWS preferred, Azure acceptable) — ECS, RDS, S3, IAM, VPCs

• Familiarity with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform preferred) and CI/CD (GitHub Actions preferred)

• Comfortable with containerisation (Docker) and Linux fundamentals

• Working knowledge of Microsoft 365 administration (Entra ID, Exchange Online, Intune, Defender) — you don’t need to be an M365 architect, but you should be able to manage the estate

• Security-first mindset — you think about attack surfaces, least privilege, and audit trails without being reminded

• Excellent communication — you can explain a technical issue to a non-technical colleague clearly

• UK-based with the right to work in the UK

Strong Preference

• Experience in financial services, trading, or fintech — you understand why uptime, data integrity, and regulatory compliance matter

• Exposure to digital assets, crypto custody, blockchain infrastructure, or DeFi

• Experience with AI-assisted development (Claude, Copilot, or similar) — or genuine curiosity about it

• Experience with observability stacks (Grafana, Prometheus, OpenTelemetry)

• Familiarity with event-driven architectures and message brokers (NATS, Kafka, or similar)

• Windows 11 enterprise deployment and hardening experience

The Right Mindset

• You’re a builder first. You’d rather write code that solves a problem than buy a SaaS tool that almost solves it.

• You’re comfortable with breadth. Deploying a microservice in the morning and troubleshooting a colleague’s VPN in the afternoon doesn’t feel like a demotion — it’s just the reality of a small team.

• You take ownership. If something’s broken, you fix it. If something’s missing, you build it. You don’t wait to be told.

• You’re curious about technology beyond your current role. You have a home lab, side projects, or opinions about things most people don’t think about.

• You understand that in a small team, ego is expensive. You’ll pair with the CTO one hour and help a colleague reset their password the next.

What We Offer

• A software engineering role with real ownership — not tickets from a backlog you had no part in shaping

• Direct impact — your code ships to production and your work is visible to the entire company from day one

• A modern stack (TypeScript, Kotlin, Rust) with AI tooling baked into the daily workflow

• Exposure to institutional digital asset infrastructure at the cutting edge of finance and technology

• An FCA-regulated environment on your CV, which carries weight in financial services careers

• A small, senior team where you’ll learn fast and growth won’t be bottlenecked by hierarchy

• Hybrid working with flexibility for the right person

How to Apply

Send your CV and a brief note explaining why this role appeals to you. We’re less interested in a polished cover letter and more interested in hearing what you’ve built, broken, and fixed. If you have a GitHub profile, side projects, or a blog, include them.

We’ll move quickly for the right person. Our interview process is straightforward: an initial conversation with the CTO, a practical scenario walkthrough (not a whiteboard exam), and a brief meeting with the wider team. ukjobs@archax.com

A note on the IT side

If you’re a strong developer who’s never administered M365 or built a laptop, don’t let that put you off. The IT operations side is learnable and we’ll support you through it. What we can’t teach is engineering judgment, the instinct to automate, or the drive to build things properly. If you’ve got those, we’d like to talk.