Principal Platform Engineer

Cazoo, is the ultimate destination for car enthusiasts and buyers alike! As a leader in the market, we pride ourselves on providing unparalleled search tools, expert car guides, insightful reviews, and a comprehensive vehicle price guide. Our mission is simple: to empower buyers to find their perfect car efficiently and with confidence, while also helping automotive retailers reach millions of eager buyers.

At Cazoo, you'll be part of a team that's revolutionising the way people buy and sell cars. If you're ready to drive your career forward in a dynamic, fast-paced environment, Cazoo is the place for you. Join us and be a part of shaping the future of automotive retail!

We are looking for Principal Platform Engineer

Reports To: Director of Technology

Contract Type: Permanent

Location: Remote, UK based

About the role:

We're looking for a Principal Platform Engineer to help shape the next generation of Cazoo's technology platform.

We're undertaking a significant modernisation of our existing Azure-based architecture, moving towards more scalable, cloud-native and event-driven services. This is an opportunity to influence how our core platform evolves, improve the experience of our engineering teams and build the foundations that support our customer-facing products.

This is a hands-on technical leadership role, combining software engineering, architecture and platform strategy. You'll spend around half your time actively contributing to engineering delivery, while also helping set technical direction, mentoring engineers and driving initiatives across teams.

You'll be responsible for:

• Driving platform modernisation: Lead the design and delivery of cloud-native, event-driven services, including the safe retirement of legacy systems.

• Shaping technical direction: Own and deliver the roadmap for core platform capabilities, working with Engineering, Product and Commercial stakeholders to align priorities.

• Remaining hands-on: Write production code, review pull requests, solve complex technical problems and work directly alongside engineering teams.

• Improving developer experience: Build and evolve shared services, tooling and engineering practices that make it easier for our teams to deliver high-quality software.

• Championing engineering excellence: Improve scalability, reliability, observability and operational standards across our platform.

• Leading through collaboration: Work closely with architects, Principal Engineers and cross-functional squads to turn architectural vision into practical solutions.

• Developing our engineers: Mentor others, share knowledge and help establish consistent engineering standards across teams.

• Embracing AI-assisted engineering: Help establish effective practices and guardrails for using AI development tools to improve productivity without compromising quality or security.

You'll have genuine ownership and influence, with the opportunity to make meaningful architectural decisions while remaining close to the technology and people delivering them.

What we ideally looking for;

Extensive backend or platform engineering experience, gained building and operating high-traffic, business-critical systems, ideally within a product-led technology business.

• Strong cloud engineering expertise, preferably Azure, with a solid understanding of cloud-native architecture, managed services and infrastructure as code.

• Proficiency in a modern backend language, ideally TypeScript/Node.js, although we're open to experienced engineers with strong transferable backgrounds, such as Java.

• Experience with distributed and event-driven systems, including technologies such as Kafka, Azure Event Hubs or Service Bus.

• Solid understanding of platform technologies, including Kubernetes, Docker, Terraform, CI/CD and observability tooling.

• Experience designing data-intensive services, working with relational and non-relational databases, caching and search technologies.

• Demonstrable technical leadership, influencing architectural decisions, mentoring engineers and driving complex initiatives across multiple teams.

• Sound engineering judgement, knowing when to build versus buy, how to balance technical debt against delivery priorities and how to make pragmatic architectural decisions.

• Familiarity with AI-assisted development, using tools such as Claude Code, Cursor or GitHub Copilot with an understanding of their benefits and limitations.

Experience in automotive, marketplaces, classifieds or other consumer-facing digital platforms would be advantageous.

We're particularly interested in engineers who combine deep technical expertise with a collaborative, pragmatic approach

Perks & Benefits

Here’s how we back you:

Financials

• We more than match your commitment to your pension, so when you contribute 6% , we put in 9%, taking your total up to 15% of your base salary.

• Quarterly value-led awards with generous cash prizes.

• Referral Bonus: Recommend a colleague, get £2,000.

Work-Life

• 25 days (plus bank holidays)

• Family Enhanced leave after 6 months of service:

• Maternity/Pregnant Parent Leave: 20 weeks at 100% pay,.

• Paternity/Non-birth Parent Leave: 12 weeks at 100% pay.

• Volunteer Days: We offer 2 volunteer days a year so you can help out wherever matters to you.

Health & Peace of Mind

Comprehensive cover so you (and your favourite people) have the care you need.

• AXA Private Healthcare: High-level coverage for you, partners, and dependents-including pre-existing conditions.

• Bupa Dental: Level 2 coverage for cashback on preventative, restorative and emergency care.

• Private GP: 24/7 digital access via Help@Hand.

• Income Protection: 13 weeks of sick pay, before going onto Long term Illness cover with Canada Life

• Life Assurance: 4x basic salary covered by Unum.

• Specialist Support: Free counseling and menopause/fertility support via Peppy.

Your Growth

We hired you for your talent, and we’re committed to helping you expand it.

• Learning budget and continuous development opportunities. Every manager has a dedicated budget for your specific role development.

The Extras

• Company issued laptop.

• Perks@Work: Discounts at over 30,000 retailers and entertainment venues.

• Annual conference with top tier industry guest speakers. Past guests include names like Matthew Syed and Damian Hughes.

• Whether it’s our Summer bash or the annual festive party, we make sure we take the time to bring everyone together and celebrate in style.

• Free food & drinks in the office.

• We’re proud partners of Brentford FC, and we share the rewards with you. From tickets to matches to the bucket-list opportunity to actually play on the pitch yourself, we bring you closer to the action.

Diversity & Inclusion at Cazoo

The best ideas come from people with different backgrounds, experiences and ways of thinking. At Cazoo we are a place where people feel comfortable speaking up, contributing and growing. Bring your perspective. Bring your experience. Be yourself.