Python Engineer - Research (City of London)

About the Role:

My client are seeking a Python Research Engineer with 4+ years of experience to join their Portfolio Engineering team. In this role, you'll work on a large, production-grade Python codebase to help drive the design, performance, and scalability of data-driven research and engineering systems. The ideal candidate is analytical, performance-oriented, and passionate about leveraging Python to solve complex problems.

Responsibilities:

• Contribute to the development and maintenance of a large, modular Python codebase
• Collaborate with researchers and engineers to build robust, scalable systems for portfolio analysis and optimization
• Work with data structures and libraries such as NumPy, xarray, or pandas to process and analyze large datasets
• Identify performance bottlenecks and implement optimizations, improving system speed and efficiency (e.g., reduced runtime by X%)
• Use data-driven insights to guide engineering decisions and system design
• Maintain clean, well-documented, and testable code

Requirements:

• 1–5 years of experience in a Python engineering or research engineering role
• Proven experience working on complex, multi-module Python projects
• Strong proficiency in at least one of: NumPy, xarray, or pandas
• Demonstrated ability to improve system performance (e.g., making a pipeline or tool X% faster)
• Experience using data to make informed technical or product decisions
• Excellent problem-solving and communication skills

Nice to Have:

• Experience in quantitative finance, scientific computing, or large-scale data systems
• Familiarity with CI/CD workflows and version control (Git)
• Experience working in a research or cross-functional team environment