Platform Engineer
Summary
Platform Engineer at an options market-making trading firm in London, designing and operating cloud and hybrid infrastructure. Day to day: provisioning and monitoring Kubernetes (EKS and on-prem), Kafka, Spark, and AWS data services; automating with Terraform, Ansible, Jenkins, and GitLab; and maintaining reliable, performant production systems.
About Akuna:
Akuna Capital is an innovative trading firm with a strong focus on collaboration, cutting-edge technology, data driven solutions, and automation. We specialize in providing liquidity as an options market maker – meaning we are committed to providing competitive quotes that we are willing to both buy and sell. To do this successfully, we design and implement our own low latency technologies, trading strategies, and mathematical models.
Our Founding Partners first conceptualized Akuna in their hometown of Sydney. They opened the firm’s first office in 2011 in the heart of the derivatives industry and the options capital of the world – Chicago. Today, Akuna is proud to operate from additional offices in Sydney, Shanghai, London, and Singapore.
What you’ll do as a Platform Engineer at Akuna:
This is an exciting role where you will be given the opportunity to take ownership of projects and make them your own. At Akuna, we are constantly looking for ways to improve our efficiency as we continue to grow. As a Platform Engineer, you will work closely with our Trading, Development, Infrastructure, and Operations teams. You will design and implement cloud solutions, automate infrastructure as code, improve cloud governance and security, and monitor our hybrid-cloud environments. In this role, you will:
- Ensure cloud services are leveraged to their full potential (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud) and best practices are being followed
- Help manage our public cloud growth and continuously improve Akuna’s hybrid-cloud operating model
- Evaluate proposed solution architectures and provide recommendations
- Provision, configure, upgrade, and monitor technologies such as Kubernetes (EKS and on-premise), Spark, Kafka, and other large-scale distributed databases
- Automate infrastructure management and development pipelines with tools like Terraform, Ansible, Jenkins and GitLab
- Explore new technologies in the cloud-native/container ecosystem
- Work with Infrastructure and Development teams to monitor systems, clusters and cloud deployments to detect errors and monitor performance
- Adhere to the engineering mindset of creating and maintaining performant and reliable production systems
Qualities that make great candidates:
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field
- 5+ years of experience in Platform Engineering, Cloud Engineering, SRE, DevOps, or related infrastructure roles
- AWS Certified Solutions Architect certification preferred
- Deep experience deploying, operating, and scaling Kubernetes in production, including on-premise clusters and Amazon EKS
- Strong expertise designing and managing cloud infrastructure on AWS; experience with GCP is a plus
- Advanced proficiency with Terraform and Infrastructure as Code (IaC), including reusable module development, state management, and platform automation
- Experience building and operating highly available, scalable, and secure cloud-native platforms
- Strong knowledge of observability, including monitoring, logging, alerting, and operational troubleshooting
- Proven experience designing and maintaining CI/CD pipelines and modern software delivery practices
- Strong Linux systems administration and troubleshooting skills in distributed production environments
- Proficiency in automation and scripting with Python, Bash, or similar languages
- Experience with cloud-native data services, including Amazon RDS, Aurora, Redshift, and DynamoDB
- Demonstrated ability to lead technical initiatives, influence architectural decisions, and mentor engineers
- Strong communication and collaboration skills, with experience partnering across engineering, operations, and business teams
- The ability to react quickly and accurately to rapidly changing market conditions, including the ability to quickly and accurately respond and/or solve math and coding problems are essential functions of the role
In addition to technical skillsets, Akuna values the unique perspectives people can bring to the table to collaboratively solve complex problems and drive Akuna forward. We want everyone to feel empowered to apply. We welcome your application and encourage you to take the first steps toward your future with us!
Please note that level/title will be determined upon the conclusion of the interview process. If you are a current student or recent graduate, please take a look at our Entry Level and Intern positions.
Skills
As published by greenhouse · 20 questions · 5 written answers
Basics
First Name, Last Name, Email, Phone, Resume/CV, Cover Letter, Location
Short answers (6)
- Preferred First Name optional
- LinkedIn Profile optional
- What is your legal full name?
- Do you go by any other name, other than the name indicated above? optional
- Please confirm your graduation year and month for your highest education. Thank you.
- Do you have any offer deadlines that we should be aware of?
Pick from a list (9)
- Please confirm your legal authorization to work in London (Note: In accordance with Akuna's statutory obligations, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United Kingdom, and to complete the required employment eligibility verification document upon hire.)
- Do you now, or will you in the future, require immigration sponsorship for work authorization in the U.K.?
- How many years of previous DevOps/Cloud Engineering experience do you have?
- Do you have an existing AWS Certified Solutions Architect certification?
- Have you applied to a full time or internship position with Akuna (any office location) in the past?
- If you are successful in the interview process, would you be able to start this role by mid-November?
- I certify that all information I have provided in order to apply for this position with Akuna is true, complete, and accurate. I understand further that if any information provided by me is found to be false, misleading, or misrepresented in any respect, that will be sufficient cause to eliminate me from further consideration for employment or may result in my immediate termination, whenever it is discovered.
- Assessment Timeframe Acknowledgement
- Please note the expectation for this role is to work onsite in our London office on a hybrid basis (for most teams, between 2-3 days/week after passing the probation period) - please confirm this works for you.
Written answers (5)
- If you select "I am a foreign national with a visa with permission to work in the UK" from above question, please provide further details about your current visa condition, such as visa type, effective and end date. Thank you. optional
- If you select "I require sponsorship to work in the UK", please provide additional detail about your sponsorship needs, current work authorization status, or eligibility for a work authorization status. (Please skip this question if you do not require work authorization.) optional
- How did you first hear about Akuna?
- If you selected 'Other', how did you first hear about Akuna? (please be specific) optional
- Please kindly share any details of your notice period at your current employer, as well as any non-compete terms if relevant? optional