Tech Lead (AWS / TypeScript)

JobCubby; Manchester; Hybrid; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

JobCubby is seeking a Tech Lead to steer a high-volume online marketplace through a major AWS/TypeScript transformation. You’ll set technical direction across cloud, architecture, data, auth, front-end and APIs, and lead the shift from PHP/Laravel toward a service-based stack in TypeScript and Node.

The role is hands-on and strategic, requiring strong leadership, architectural vision, and the ability to move quickly in a fast-paced scale-up, with on-site collaboration in Manchester and proximity

Qualifications

• Experience leading cloud-based architectures at scale.
• Proven track record building service-based platforms in AWS with infrastructure as code.
• Ability to decompose monoliths into microservices and drive migration patterns.

Responsibilities

• Define and align technical strategy across cloud, data, auth, and APIs.
• Lead architectural decisions and set engineering standards for the team.
• Collaborate with product and delivery to move quickly in a fast-paced environment.

Skills

AWS

TypeScript

JavaScript

Engineering leadership

Service-based architecture

Frontend APIs

Tools

Terraform

CDK

Laravel

Job description

Tech Lead (AWS / TypeScript)

Contract, outside IR35. Manchester-based client, starting as soon as possible.

The engagement

You’ll lead engineering on a high-volume online marketplace, part-way through a major, multi-year technology transformation. A version 2 build is underway, and a move to AWS is under active evaluation as part of that.

The current client-facing platform runs on PHP and Laravel. The direction of travel is a service-based architecture built in TypeScript and Node, with PHP likely retained in places. You’ll set technical direction across that shift while keeping delivery moving.

You’ll need to be hands‑on and broad: someone who understands cloud, architecture, data, auth, front‑end and APIs, and has built service-based platforms in AWS before. In an older structure this person would have carried an architect title.

This is a demanding, fast-paced environment. You’ll need to be productive quickly without a long ramp.

Location and basis

Our client is based in Manchester. While there’s no set number of days you’re required on site, there will be times when the team needs to be together in person for important meetings, workshops and key moments. When that’s the case, we’d expect you to attend.

For that reason, we’re only considering candidates based within 50 miles of Manchester.

The platform

This is a genuinely large-scale marketplace. Very few platforms handle a product catalogue or transaction volume at this level.

The roadmap includes agentic AI workflows built into the platform, retail media integrated directly into the marketplace, and infrastructure work targeting cost and performance at high volume.

A lot of this is being attempted at volumes that have rarely been tested in a marketplace before, so the work leans research-led rather than routine.

Who this suits

This is a fast-paced scale-up environment on a complex platform.

You’ll do well here if you think strategically rather than transactionally, and you can advocate for technical change and bring people with you.

What we need

• Principal-level engineering breadth across cloud, architecture, data, auth, front‑end and APIs
• Track record building service-based platforms in AWS, with infrastructure as code (Terraform or CDK)
• Experience decomposing a monolith into services, ideally via the strangler pattern
• You write TypeScript and JavaScript, and can read and work with PHP (Laravel)
• You bring AI and agentic workflows into your engineering practice
• You set and hold engineering standards, and communicate decisions with authority
• Comfortable leading delivery in a fast-moving, complex environment
• Comfortable working in English, written and spoken

Nice to have:

• Retail or e-commerce background
• Experience leading through a major re-architecture or cloud migration