C++ Software Engineer - Low-latency systems

Ocean Red; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Private medical

Pension

Discretionary bonus

Enhanced parental leave

Life assurance

Income protection

Electric car scheme

Cycle to work

Flexible hours

Job summary

Ocean Red is recruiting a senior C++ engineer to join a core engineering team delivering real-time trading infrastructure. You will design, implement and optimize ultra-low-latency components that process market data and orders with high reliability.

This hybrid role requires three days in the office, with collaboration across infrastructure, product and QA. Proficiency in C++, Linux, networking, Python and Boost is essential; exposure to FIX is a plus.

Qualifications

• Experience building or maintaining real-time or event-driven systems.
• Solid Linux development experience and understanding of networking (TCP, UDP or multicast).
• Exposure to financial markets technology such as FIX or other trading protocols is useful.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain real-time, low-latency trading infrastructure.
• Design and optimize event-driven architectures for high throughput and reliability.
• Collaborate with infrastructure, product and quality teams to ensure stable releases.

Skills

C++

Linux

Networking

Python

Tools

Boost

Git

SQL

Messaging systems

Distributed architectures

Job description

Company | Financial markets infrastructure firm (exchange & trading technology)

Size | ~250 people globally

Technology | C++, Linux, Networking, Python

Hybrid | 3 days a week in the office

Offer | Various levels considered Mid & Senior

Benefits | Private medical, pension, discretionary bonus, enhanced parental leave, life assurance, income protection, electric car scheme, cycle to work, flexible hours

The Work

Not every C++ job sits this close to a live market.

You’ll be building the software that processes trading activity in real time, systems that must stay reliable under heavy message throughput and respond in microseconds, not milliseconds.

Your work will sit inside a core engineering team responsible for the platform that powers electronic markets across Europe.

You’ll spend your time solving problems like:

• Processing thousands of market events every second
• Designing software that stays stable under extreme load
• Improving latency, performance and system resilience

You won’t be working in isolation either. You’ll collaborate daily with engineers focused on infrastructure, product and quality to ensure every release is stable and production-ready.

And the problems are genuinely technical.

You’ll work on event-driven systems, networking protocols and real-time architectures where small design decisions have a measurable impact on performance.

The engineering team is compact and experienced. You’ll have the freedom to explore solutions, challenge ideas and contribute to architectural discussions, not just implement tickets.

What you’ll need

This environment suits someone who enjoys deep technical problems and systems that must perform under pressure.

You’ll likely bring:

• Experience building or maintaining real-time or event-driven systems
• Solid Linux development experience and understanding of networking (TCP, UDP or multicast)

And you’ll probably recognise some of the following:

C++, Boost, Python, Git, SQL, messaging systems, distributed architectures.

Exposure to financial markets technology such as FIX or other trading protocols is useful, but not essential if you’ve worked on other high-throughput systems.