Engineering Manager

We are looking for a hands-on Engineering Manager/Technical Leader who can lead engineering teams while remaining deeply involved in architecture, system design, development, and technology decisions. The ideal candidate will have strong full-stack engineering expertise with mandatory Node.js and React.js experience, combined with proven experience in AI/LLM-based enterprise systems. We are particularly interested in candidates who have worked in Unicorn companies, maritime/shipping technology, IoT/connected systems, or B2B SaaS/enterprise product companies. Experience in any one or more of these domains will be considered relevant.

Responsibilities:

• Lead and mentor a team of engineers while remaining hands-on with architecture, system design, coding, and technical problem-solving.
• Architect and build scalable microservices-based platforms and AI-enabled enterprise products.
• Design and deliver high-performance, highly available systems capable of handling large-scale workloads.
• Drive development of AI-powered applications, including agentic AI systems, LLM-based solutions, and RAG pipelines.
• Collaborate with product and business teams to translate requirements into scalable and robust technical solutions.
• Drive execution through Agile sprint processes and structured SDLC practices.
• Establish engineering best practices around code quality, testing, architecture documentation, performance, and observability.
• Guide teams in adopting modern AI developer tools and engineering automation to improve productivity.
• Drive architecture decisions for data pipelines, big data platforms, and distributed systems.
• Provide hands-on technical leadership and contribute directly to critical engineering initiatives when required.

Requirements:

• 13-20 years of overall software development experience.
• 3+ years of engineering manager / technical leadership experience.
• Proven experience leading and mentoring engineering teams.
• Strong communication, stakeholder management, and presentation skills.
• Strong and stable career track record with meaningful tenure in previous organizations.
• Candidates with frequent job changes or multiple short stints will not be preferred unless there is a clear and valid explanation.

Full Stack Engineering (Must Have)

• Node.js and React.js are mandatory.
• Strong hands-on experience with Node.js .
• Strong hands-on experience with React.js .
• Strong experience in TypeScript / JavaScript.
• Candidates may have experience with additional backend/frontend technologies such as Java, Python, Go, etc., but should have strong full-stack engineering capabilities.
• Strong understanding of APIs, microservices, distributed systems, and scalable application architecture.

AI / LLM / Agentic AI (Must Have):

• Strong practical experience in AI/ML and generative AI is mandatory.
• The candidate should have experience in one or more of the following: Large Language Models (LLMs), Generative AI, Agentic AI / AI Agents, RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation), AI-powered enterprise applications, AI/ML model integration and productionization, Computer Vision, NLP
• Experience with frameworks/tools such as LangChain, LLaMA, YOLO, Roboflow, NeMo, Other modern LLM/GenAI frameworks
• Important: AI/LLM exposure should be demonstrated through actual product development, architecture, implementation, or production use cases. Merely mentioning AI/ML as a skill will not be sufficient.
• Data Engineering and Big Data: Strong experience with Python, PySpark, Big Data ecosystems, Hadoop, large-scale data processing pipelines, and ML/AI data workflows
• Databases: Strong experience with PostgreSQL, MySQL
• Knowledge of: Database sharding, query optimization, large-scale data storage strategies
• Distributed Systems and Messaging: Experience with event-driven and distributed architectures using Kafka, Redis, RabbitMQ, and microservices architecture
• DevOps and Cloud: Hands-on experience with Docker, Kubernetes, Nginx, AWS / GCP / Azure, cloud-native application deployment, and scalability

Development Practices (Must Have)

• Strong experience with microservices architecture.
• Experience delivering high-scale, production-grade enterprise systems.
• Strong understanding of Agile methodologies.
• Experience across the complete SDLC, including functional specifications, architecture documentation, design specifications, unit testing, performance optimization, production support, and observability.
• AI Developer Productivity: Experience using modern AI-assisted development tools such as ChatGPT, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Claude, and other AI-powered engineering/development tools.

Domain Experience (Must Have):

• The candidate should have relevant experience in at least one of the following domains:
• Unicorn / High-Growth Product Companies: Experience working with a unicorn or high-growth technology/product company will be strongly preferred.
• Maritime / Shipping Technology: Experience in maritime technology, shipping, marine technology, port/logistics technology, fleet management, vessel management, and supply-chain technology will be highly relevant
• IoT / Connected Systems: Experience with IoT platforms, connected devices, telemetry, real-time data, sensors, edge systems, industrial IoT, and connected/physical-world technology will be highly relevant.
• B2B SaaS / Enterprise Products: Strong experience building and scaling B2B SaaS platforms, enterprise software, API-driven products, multi-tenant platforms, enterprise integrations, and large-scale B2B products will be considered highly relevant.
• Candidates with experience in any one of the above four domains can be considered. Candidates with a combination of two or more will be particularly strong.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience building AI-driven SaaS/enterprise platforms.
• Experience scaling engineering teams and distributed systems.
• Strong knowledge of reliability, scalability, performance, and observability.
• Experience integrating AI/ML models into real-time production systems.
• Experience with IoT + AI/ML + B2B platforms is a strong advantage.
• Experience working closely with founders, CTOs, product leaders, and business stakeholders.

Ideal Candidate:

• The ideal candidate is a stable, hands-on full-stack engineering leader with Node.js + React.js + strong AI/LLM/agentic AI experience + engineering leadership, along with experience in at least one of these domains: Unicorn | Maritime | IoT | B2B SaaS.
• A candidate combining B2B/Unicorn + IoT/Maritime + AI/LLM + Node.js/React.js would be considered an exceptionally strong fit.
• For sourcing, I would treat these as the hard filters: Node.js + React.js mandatory.
• Strong AI/LLM/GenAI/Agentic AI: mandatory
• Stable career profile: mandatory.
• Unicorn OR Maritime OR IoT OR B2B SaaS: at least one required.
• 10-14 years + 3+ years leadership (mandatory).