Software Development Project Lead (Java)

Location: Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom, based at the Wellcome Genome Campus with flexible hybrid working arrangements.

Salary: £4,395.66 per month after tax, excluding pension and insurance contributions.

Company

hirify.global-EBI is an international research organisation providing publicly available databases and tools for storing, analysing and disseminating large biological datasets.

What you will do

• Lead the technical development, architecture and long-term scalability of Europe PMC and associated services.
• Define technical roadmaps balancing data growth, AI capabilities, new functionality, operational stability and technical debt.
• Lead, mentor and develop backend and database engineers while supporting delivery and career development.
• Collaborate with product, software engineering, machine learning and data science teams to deliver AI-enabled research services.
• Oversee large-scale ingestion and processing pipelines from international content providers.
• Ensure the reliability, performance and availability of production services and contribute to engineering best practices, planning and delivery.

Requirements

• Degree in Computer Science or equivalent professional experience.
• Experience managing technical delivery and software engineering projects in Agile environments, including Scrum and Kanban.
• Experience designing, building and operating large-scale, high-availability systems with substantial data volumes and user traffic.
• Experience recruiting, mentoring and supporting software engineers, with strong stakeholder management and communication skills.
• Strong technical expertise in several areas including Java, Spring, SQL, NoSQL databases, MongoDB, Apache Solr/Lucene, RESTful or SOAP services, Unix/Linux, shell scripting, Git/GitLab, performance optimisation, testing and production support.
• Hybrid work is based at the Wellcome Genome Campus in Hinxton, Cambridgeshire.

Nice to have

• Experience with scientific data resources, bioinformatics, biological databases, scientific publishing or research information systems.
• Experience processing terabyte-scale datasets or using high-performance and distributed computing environments such as Slurm.
• Experience with Vue, React, machine learning workflows or production ML pipelines.
• Interest in open science, scholarly communication and services that accelerate scientific discovery.

Culture & Benefits

• Collaborative international environment with software engineers, data scientists and researchers.
• Initial three-year fixed-term Staff Member contract, with potential extension subject to continued grant funding.
• Hybrid working, annual salary review, pension scheme and insurance benefits.
• Private medical insurance, 30 days of annual leave plus public holidays, and family-related benefits.
• Relocation package including an installation grant, with additional benefits for non-UK residents.
• Campus facilities include a shuttle bus, library, gym, cafeteria, nursery and sports and social clubs.

Hiring process

• Submit an up-to-date CV and supporting cover letter.
• Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis until 28 October 2026 at 23:59 CET.
• International applicants are welcome and successful candidates are offered visa exemptions.