Senior Backend Engineer (Java) at a Leading Financial Services Institution - Strivo Labs

Strivo Labs - Our client, a leading financial services institution in Africa, is delivering large-scale digital banking, payments, and lending platforms used by millions of customers across the continent. The organisation is building highly resilient, secure, and scalable systems to power its next phase of growth. They are seeking an experienced candidate to play a key role in designing, building, and operating mission-critical backend systems within a regulated financial environment in the capacity below:

Job Title: Senior Backend Engineer (Java)

Location: Ikeja, Lagos
Employment Type: Full-Time

Role Overview

• The Senior Backend Engineer will be responsible for designing, developing, and maintaining high-performance backend services using Java and modern microservices architectures.
• This role requires deep expertise in distributed systems, API design, data management, and secure financial systems.
• You will work closely with product managers, frontend engineers, DevOps, and security teams to deliver robust platforms that meet strict performance, reliability, and regulatory requirements.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and develop scalable backend services using Java (Spring Boot, Spring Cloud).
• Architect and maintain microservices and API-based platforms for high-volume financial transactions.
• Build and optimise data access layers using relational and NoSQL databases.
• Implement secure authentication, authorisation, and data protection mechanisms.
• Ensure system reliability, performance tuning, and fault tolerance in production environments.
• Lead code reviews, enforce engineering best practices, and mentor mid-level engineers.
• Collaborate with DevOps teams on CI/CD pipelines, containerisation, and cloud deployments.
• Participate in architecture discussions and contribute to long-term platform strategy.
• Ensure compliance with regulatory, audit, and security standards common to financial services.

Required Skills & Experience

• Advanced proficiency in Java, Spring Boot, Spring MVC, and RESTful API design.
• 6+ years of professional backend engineering experience, with a strong focus on Java.
• Strong experience with microservices architecture and distributed systems.
• Solid understanding of SQL (PostgreSQL, MySQL, Oracle) and experience with NoSQL databases.
• Experience with message queues and event-driven systems (Kafka, RabbitMQ, etc.).
• Experience with containerisation and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes).
• Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP).
• Strong understanding of system design, performance optimisation, and scalability.
• Experience working in regulated environments (banking, fintech, payments) is a strong advantage.

Nice to Have:

• Experience with high-throughput transaction systems.
• Knowledge of financial protocols, payments systems, or core banking platforms.
• Exposure to reactive programming and asynchronous processing.
• Prior experience leading technical initiatives or small engineering teams.

What We Offer

• Opportunity to work on large-scale, high-impact financial platforms.
• Competitive compensation and benefits.
• A strong engineering culture with emphasis on quality and reliability.
• Hybrid working environment and career growth opportunities.

Application Closing Date
Not Specified.

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should send their CV and a brief note about why you’d be a great fit to: hiring@strivolabs.com using the Job Title as the subject of the email.