Senior Backend Engineer

About the role

First Circle, a fast-growing, credit-centric neo-bank in Southeast Asia, is hiring senior developers to build its own backend services while expanding its product range and markets. The role is primarily remote, with the option to work from the Belgrade office, and is open to candidates hired globally.

Key responsibilities

• Build and evolve backend services and APIs that are fast, reliable and easy to change.
• Take features from idea to production: define the approach with product and design, ship them, measure results and improve them.
• Help make architectural decisions, write technical proposals and balance speed with long-term quality.
• Set up early detection of issues, respond quickly to incidents and support users when things go wrong.
• Review code, share knowledge and help other engineers grow.
• Work with product, design and business teams to turn real needs into practical technical solutions and explain trade-offs clearly.

Required profile

• 5+ years of experience building and operating production backend systems in Kotlin, Java or Ruby.
• Experience in a startup environment, fintech, payroll, payments or banking is a strong plus (especially shipping products in regulated environments).
• Comfortable working in a fast-moving environment where priorities can evolve.

Required skills

• Strong foundations in API design, relational databases and data modeling, including keeping data consistent as systems scale.
• Hands-on experience running services in production: debugging, incident investigation and improving resilience.
• Curiosity about AI and practical experience using it, such as LLM-powered features or AI tools.

What we offer

• No fixed budget; offers adjusted to experience and market rate.
• Primarily remote work, with offices in London, Hong Kong, Singapore and Belgrade.
• MacBooks, private health insurance, training budgets and the chance to travel to Southeast Asia.