Senior PHP Backend Engineer — Remote, Microservices & Scale

Smart Working; Islamabad; Remote; PKR 33,241,000 - 49,861,000; Full time

Job summary

Smart Working is seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to own and evolve large-scale production backend systems, handling GPS, telematics, DVR video, and real-time alerts. The role is full-time, long-term, with a November 2026 start date, in a small, expert team focusing on security and GDPR compliance for public-sector clients.

You'll contribute to API development, migrations to Laravel and PostgreSQL, and collaborate on AI-related work in a fully backend-focused environment.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of commercial PHP backend development at Expert level.
• 5+ years of experience with large-scale SaaS or complex production systems at Expert level; simple or low-traffic systems will not meet the required standard.
• 3+ years of PostgreSQL experience at Advanced level.
• 5+ years of API design and third-party integration experience at Advanced level.
• 3+ years of Laravel and/or Yii2 experience at Advanced level.
• 3+ years of PHPUnit experience at Advanced level; Pest or Codeception may substitute.
• 2+ years of microservices or monolith-decomposition experience at Intermediate level.
• 2+ years of AWS experience at Intermediate level; Azure or GCP may substitute.

Responsibilities

• Own and evolve the PHP backend that ingests GPS and telematics data, safety hardware events and DVR video, and sends real-time alerts.
• Build and maintain APIs used by the web platform, mobile application and integration partners.
• Deliver the ongoing Yii2-to-Laravel migration, with Yii2 at end of life and roughly a year remaining to complete.
• Deliver the MariaDB-to-PostgreSQL migration.
• Support the decomposition of the existing monolith into microservices.
• Take over systems from a retiring contractor and become productive quickly despite limited documentation.
• Support the backend for the AI product line, collaborating with the lead on computer vision work.
• Take end-to-end ownership of production systems.

Skills

PHP

Laravel

Yii2

PostgreSQL

API design

Microservices

AWS

Event-driven

CI/CD

Security

GDPR

Tools

Bitbucket Pipelines

PHPUnit

Job description

Smart Working is seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to own and evolve large-scale production backend systems, handling GPS, telematics, DVR video, and real-time alerts. The role is full-time, long-term, with a November 2026 start date, in a small, expert team focusing on security and GDPR compliance for public-sector clients.

You'll contribute to API development, migrations to Laravel and PostgreSQL, and collaborate on AI-related work in a fully backend-focused environment.