Principal Software Engineer

Kueski; México; On-site; MXN 1,000,000 - 1,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Kueski is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to own the technical strategy across Kueski Pay, Kueski Cash, and the shared platforms behind them, reporting to the CTO. This role is ideal for an engineer with strong architectural judgment and a track record of setting multi-year technical direction in fintech-grade environments.

As a key leader, you will translate company priorities into a coherent multi-year architecture, make trade-offs explicit, and define the strategy that makes Kueski an

Qualifications

• 15+ years building software.
• 4+ years at Staff, Principal, or equivalent leadership across multiple teams.
• Track record delivering multi-year architecture for high-scale, distributed systems.
• Measurable impact on reliability, cost, or delivery speed.
• Several years designing and shipping ML/AI systems in production at scale.
• Experience with MLOps/LLMOps tooling and observability.
• Experience partnering with C-level leaders and translating strategy into roadmaps.
• Fintech/payments or regulated industry experience with security and compliance.

Responsibilities

• Define multi-year technical strategy across domains with CTPO and leadership.
• Set architectural principles for scalability, reliability, and maintainability.
• Translate priorities into architecture with explicit trade-offs and roadmaps.
• Lead AI-native transformation with governance by Risk, Compliance, and Security.
• Coach Staff and Senior engineers and influence hiring and promotions.

Skills

ML/AI production

Distributed systems

Software architecture

Fintech/payments domain

Security & compliance

MLOps/LLMOps

Leadership

C-level collaboration

English & Spanish

Job description

About Kueski

At Kueski, we're dedicated to improving the financial lives of people in Mexico. Since 2012, we've been the leading buy now, pay later (BNPL) and online consumer credit platform in Latin America, known for our innovative financial services. Our flagship product, Kueski Pay, provides seamless payment solutions for both online and in-store transactions, establishing itself as the preferred option for nearly 30% of Mexico's top e-commerce merchants. Notably, we were the first to introduce BNPL on Amazon Mexico.

About Kueski

At Kueski, we're dedicated to improving the financial lives of people in Mexico. Since 2012, we've been the leading buy now, pay later (BNPL) and online consumer credit platform in Latin America, known for our innovative financial services. Our flagship product, Kueski Pay, provides seamless payment solutions for both online and in-store transactions, establishing itself as the preferred option for nearly 30% of Mexico's top e-commerce merchants. Notably, we were the first to introduce BNPL on Amazon Mexico.

We're a tech company with a culture geared toward innovation, collaboration, and impact, fostering a strong, diverse, and inclusive workplace. Our commitment to excellence and ethical business practices has earned us multiple industry recognitions. In 2024, we were named one of the World’s Top FinTech Companies by CNBC and recognized as one of the most ethical companies in Mexico by AMITAI. Additionally, we were certified as a Best Place to Work for LGBTQ+ Equality by HRC Equidad MX 2025 and ranked among the Best Companies for Female Talent by EFY.

Position

Kueski is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to own technical strategy across Kueski Pay, Kueski Cash, and the shared platforms behind them, reporting to the CTO. This role is ideal for an engineer with strong architectural judgment and a track record of setting multi-year technical direction in environments with fintech-grade expectations for reliability, security, fraud prevention, and compliance.

As a key leader, you will translate company priorities into a coherent multi-year architecture, make trade-offs explicit, and define the strategy that makes Kueski an AI-native engineering organization. You will raise the decision quality of Staff and Senior engineers and be accountable for ensuring Kueski’s systems scale with the business.

Key Responsabilities

Technical Strategy & Architecture

• Define the multi-year technical strategy across domains with the CTPO and engineering and product leadership.
• Set the architectural principles and standards for scalability, reliability, and maintainability across Kueski’s systems; with compliance, fraud prevention, security, and regulatory requirements built in from the start.
• Turn ambiguous problems into clear proposals with explicit scope, trade-offs, and build, buy, or partner decisions.
• Reduce systemic technical debt and recurring failures while improving throughput, using delivery and quality metrics (throughput, cycle time, CFR, MTTR) to guide roadmaps.

AI-Native Transformation

• Own the AI-native transformation roadmap: decide what to wrap, refactor, expose, or retire so AI agents can work safely on existing systems.
• Define the AI-native SDLC and the context engineering standards that make Kueski’s code, data, and business logic usable by models and agents.
• Lead high-stakes AI capabilities into production with measured business impact, under governance built with Risk, Compliance, and Security.

Engineering Leadership & Influence

• Set technical direction for the AI Enabling Team, and coach and sponsor Staff and Senior engineers.
• Shape how Kueski hires and promotes senior engineering talent.
• Communicate technical direction to executives and represent Kueski’s engineering externally.

Job Requirements

• 15+ years building software, with 4+ years at Staff, Principal, or equivalent technical-leadership scope across multiple teams.
• Track record defining and delivering multi-year architecture for high-scale, distributed, transactional systems.
• Deep expertise in distributed systems, financial domain modeling (money movement, ledgering, identity), observability, CI/CD, and cloud infrastructure.
• Evidence of measurable impact on reliability (CFR, MTTR, incident reduction), cost of ownership, or delivery speed.
• Several years designing and shipping ML/AI systems in production at scale, including agentic or LLM-based systems.
• Familiarity with MLOps/LLMOps tooling and production observability for AI.
• A point of view, backed by results, on transforming a legacy engineering organization into an AI-native one.
• Preferred experience in fintech, payments, lending, or another regulated industry, with hands-on work on security, fraud, and compliance; ideally shipping AI in credit, risk, collections, fraud, or underwriting.
• Experience partnering directly with C-level leaders and translating strategy into technical roadmaps.
• Proven record of growing senior engineers into Staff-level leaders.
• Excellent written and spoken communication in English and Spanish.

Diversity & Inclusion

At Kueski we embrace diversity in all forms, systematically promote equity, and ensure everyone feels included with a sense of belonging. We are committed to the full inclusion of all qualified candidates. As part of this commitment, we will make efforts to ensure reasonable accommodations are made during the hiring process. If reasonable accommodation is needed, please let the Talent Acquisition team know.