Senior Back End Engineer
On-siteJohannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa
Job Summary
Design and maintain the core backend architecture for Elixirr's AI-augmented consulting and agent platforms using AWS, Azure, and open-source frameworks. Drive decisions on microservices, containerization, and serverless solutions while owning services end-to-end, including testing, deployment, and on-call rotation. Operate fluently across a modern AI developer stack by writing precise specifications, harness-based acceptance criteria, and treating prompts and evals as first-class engineering artifacts. Build internal guardrails for security, compliance, and AI-assisted development safety, then mentor engineers across UK, Croatia, and South Africa teams on best practices for cloud-native and AI-enhanced workflows.
Required Qualifications
- 5+ years building and operating large-scale backend systems in cloud environments (AWS and/or Azure)
- Strong proficiency in Python and/or at least one major backend language/framework (e.g., FastAPI, Django, Java/Spring Boot, Node.js)
- Experience with microservices, RESTful API design, event-driven and serverless architectures
- Familiarity with containerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, CloudFormation, ARM/Bicep)
- Solid understanding of relational and NoSQL databases (e.g., PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, DynamoDB, Cosmos DB)
- Demonstrable daily use of AI-assisted developer tools (coding agents, Copilot-style assistants, AI code review, AI-driven test generation) with a clear view on where they help and where they don't
- Experience writing and reviewing AI-generated code with the same (or higher) rigor as human-written code
- Comfort integrating LLMs, machine learning models, agent frameworks and evaluation tooling into backend services
- Hands-on with CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps) and modern practices for automated testing, code quality and safe deployment
- Familiarity with DORA metrics and engineering analytics to measure the impact of changes in process and tooling
- Excellent communication and problem-solving; a track record of delivering complex projects on time
- Self-driven and proactive — you pick up new tools, form a view, and bring the team with you
- Bachelor's or Master's in Computer Science, Engineering or a related field — or equivalent professional experience
Desired Qualifications
- Multi-cloud experience: hands-on with both AWS and Azure in production
- Familiarity with enterprise security and compliance standards (SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR)
- Previous exposure to consulting or professional services environments
- Experience working in distributed teams across multiple time zones
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