Database Platform Tech Lead

Responsibilities

• Set the database reliability standard: Architect the failover mechanisms, replication topology, and recovery strategies that meet our availability targets - and own the engineering roadmap that closes the gap between where we are and the number of 9s the business requires.
• Drive toward zero-touch operations: Define what fully automated database operations look like - provisioning and scaling to zero-downtime migrations - and lead the platform work that gets us there.
• Own the database technology strategy: Define which database technology fits which problem - set the criteria for adoption, govern the portfolio, and ensure every database choice is intentional and operated with the same level of rigour.
• Define the database contract with product teams: Set the standards for how product engineers interact with databases - schema governance, migration patterns, connection pooling, query performance - and build the tooling that makes it effortless to get right.
• Own the platform end to end: Set the operational bar - define on-call practices and incident response standards for database failures, and hold the team to them.
• Own the direction and drive it forward: Define the long-term database platform strategy, drive cross-team initiatives from kickoff to delivery, and align database infrastructure decisions with broader engineering, compliance, and cost goals.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in database engineering, platform engineering, or a related systems discipline, with a track record of technical leadership.
• Deep, hands-on PostgreSQL expertise: strong opinions on replication, sharding, backup strategies, upgrades, and security. Hands-on experience with Postgres automation and lifecycle tooling is required.
• Familiarity with ClickHouse and Cassandra/Scylla in production environments.
• Solid backend engineering background - Go is preferred but any strong language is welcome; familiarity with Kotlin/JVM is a plus as you'll work directly with product teams who rely on it.
• A track record of turning database best practices into opinionated standards that engineering teams actually adopt.
• Cloud-native in your DNA: hands-on with Kubernetes and IaC tooling, running production workloads on AWS or equivalent.
• Proven ability to define technical strategy, drive cross-team initiatives end-to-end, and hold yourself and others accountable to outcomes.
• Ability to contribute to architectural decisions and clearly communicate trade-offs to both engineers and leadership.
• The ability to work in a flexible hybrid setup, with 2-3 days a week in the office.
• WHY YOU SHOULD APPLY NOW
• Our culture rewards ownership, excellence, and high energy. We care deeply about outcomes and hold each other accountable - we're here to win and fix one of the largest challenges Europeans face - closing the pension gap and democratising wealth. If this gets you fired up, reach out!

Benefits

Additional Information

Please note that these positions are based in London, Berlin, or Paris - relocation support is provided if required. THE BEST WORK OF YOUR CAREER Trade Republic is the largest savings platform in Europe - we operate in 18 countries, serving +10 million customers who trust us with over €150B in assets. But we're striving for more. We have a bold mission to empower everyone to build wealth with easy, safe, and free access to financial systems. You will have the opportunity to grow your career by collaborating with a team of outstanding talents and state of the art technology to build a lasting, positive future for millions. ABOUT PLATFORM ENGINEERING Platform Engineering is the backbone of Trade Republic's engineering velocity. Our mission is to build scalable platforms for a Europe-scale bank - serving internal engineers, and building in-house control planes for managing the bank's infrastructure. We're a ~50-person Platform team focused on one thing: enabling product engineers to move fast and operate autonomously by default. We build self-service platforms, golden paths, and opinionated tooling so that over 300 engineers can ship with confidence. From Kubernetes fleet management and CI/CD to an internal Developer Hub built on Backstage, our work underpins every trade, savings plan, and card payment that flows through the platform.

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