Head of Engineering

IntellectEU is an international technology company focused on digital finance and emerging technologies. We give rising talent and industry veterans the space to explore, launch ideas, and collaborate closely with our clients. Over the past two decades, we have earned our expertise in financial technology, executing on hundreds of complex integrations and co-creating new digital asset platforms alongside our clients.

We are seeking an experienced Head of Engineeringto lead our engineering organisation, own technical strategy, and make sure we deliver secure solutions across the company. This is a player-coach role: you lead engineering company-wide and you also work as a hands-on contributor, designing systems and writing code alongside the team.

You will also work side by side with our Head of Security and security team. They define security requirements and recommendations. You hold the authority and accountability to implement them across our infrastructure, primarily our multi-account AWS organisation, and to make sure they are delivered on time.

The ideal candidate leads engineers and engineering managers, writes and reviews code and designs systems themselves, and is comfortable making trade-offs across teams, budgets, and risk.

Location: Belgium, Portugal, Poland, Spain.

Responsibilities:

• Lead the engineering organisation, own technical strategy, and set engineering standards and best practices across the company.
• Act as a hands-on technical contributor and architect: design systems, write and review code, and unblock delivery on digital assets and AI initiatives.
• Partner with the Head of Security and security team, and own the implementation of their recommendations across our infrastructure, primarily our multi-account AWS organisation. This includes prioritising the work, directing engineering and DevOps teams, and holding the authority to make the changes.
• Own cloud infrastructure and operations on AWS: architecture, reliability, cost, disaster recovery, and operational readiness, including incident investigation and root-cause analysis.
• Work with Product Managers, Architects, and stakeholders to define technical solutions and delivery priorities that match business objectives and customer needs.
• Manage engineering budgets, cloud expenditure, and vendor relationships, and make clear trade-offs across teams.
• Improve engineering processes, team productivity, and software quality, and manage technical debt.
• Hire, onboard, and develop engineering talent, including Engineering Managers and Architects.
• Build a strong engineering culture focused on accountability, collaboration, quality, and continuous learning.

Requirements:

Must have

• 10+ years of experience in software engineering, with 5+ years in senior technical leadership roles.
• Hands-on technical depth: you still design systems and write or review code, and you are happy to work as an individual contributor alongside the team.
• Proven experience leading Engineering Managers, Architects, and multiple engineering teams.
• Strong experience with AWS, including multi-account organisations, infrastructure as code, networking, identity and access management, and cloud security.
• Experience working with a security team and turning security requirements and audit findings into delivered engineering changes, with strong knowledge of cybersecurity, compliance, risk management, and data protection.
• Experience building production systems in digital assets (blockchain, DLT, tokenisation, custody, wallets) or in AI (machine learning, LLM-based applications), ideally both. Depth in one area with real curiosity in the other is sufficient.
• Strong expertise in software architecture, system design, microservices, distributed systems, scalable SaaS platforms, and disaster recovery.
• Experience in fintech or financial services, or other regulated platforms.
• Experience defining technology strategy, architecture roadmaps, and engineering standards aligned with business objectives.
• Proven ability to manage technology budgets, cloud expenditure, vendor relationships, and technology investments.
• Experience scaling engineering organisations and managing technical debt.
• Excellent strategic thinking, communication, stakeholder management, and decision-making skills.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with financial infrastructure companies, such as payment, messaging, or banking technology providers, and an understanding of how they operate.
• Experience with payments, SWIFT financial messaging standards and infrastructure, or banking integrations.
• Experience with financial services compliance and regulatory frameworks (for example SOC 2, ISO 27001, or similar).
• Experience with both digital assets and AI, or experience applying AI in financial services.

We guarantee:

• International experience in a stable company: the company has offices in Miami, Antwerp, Leuven, Lisbon, Krakow, Kyiv, New York and operates on the market for over 15 years.
• Passionate team in an innovative casual, positive, and open work environment ready to meet your new ideas.
• Great opportunities for personal and professional development as well as the chance to change the way the business works in the financial world.