VP of Engineering: Java Open-Source Data Infrastructure

Package: -175k - -217k base + 15% bonus + options

Location: UK remote-first.

My client, a profitable, Series-D software company (circa 110 people, $40-45M ARR) behind one of the most widely-used open-source real-time data platforms in the world are looking for a VP of Engineering with a strong technical / Engineering background (ideally in Java).

The person will own the engineering direction and execution. It''s the top engineering seat: 40 engineers, 3 engineering managers reporting in to you,

Person Specification:

You''re an architect-leaning technical leader who can run a bigger organisation. Technical depth is your anchor you''ve never traded it for scope. You can still name the domain you''re genuinely excellent at, unprompted, three levels deep: distributed systems, low-latency engineering, JVM performance, stream processing, or storage and replication internals.

You''ve probably written or contributed to Java open source, spoken at conferences, and within the last couple of years you''ve personally worked a hard technical problem, not just funded one.

You''ve also made the hard personnel calls: hired well, exited when needed, set direction that holds when you''re not in the room.

You''ve shipped on a date against a plan and can say what you cut. And you''ve done it at a scale-up leading through growth, not administering a machine that already existed.

This is probably not you if: you were technical once but your last hands-on problem was five years ago; you''ve only ever operated inside large enterprises; or you''re a pure architect who''s never owned a headcount decision.