Remote Principal Architect for Wealth & Retirement Systems

Bridgenext; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Bridgenext is seeking a Principal Engineer / Technical Architect with deep hands-on engineering and strong US retirement domain insight to drive architecture and modernization initiatives. You will own detailed design for enterprise modernization across wealth and asset management, review code, and guide engineering teams.

This remote US-based role emphasizes collaboration, scalability, and security. The ideal candidate has 10+ years in software engineering with leadership in large-scale

Qualifications

• 10+ years of software engineering, with 3+ years as Principal Engineer or Architect on large-scale enterprise platforms.
• Strong backend depth in Java/Spring Boot, .NET/C#, or Python with production-quality code.
• Hands-on experience with Azure and distributed systems, microservices, containers/Kubernetes, and serverless components.
• Proven API design experience using REST/OpenAPI, API gateways, messaging and event streaming.
• Knowledge of relational and NoSQL databases, caching, and data persistence patterns.
• Financial services domain experience in US Retirement, wealth or asset management.
• Security-focused designs including IAM, encryption, audit trails, and secure coding practices.
• Ability to mentor teams, communicate with stakeholders, and drive modernization programs.

Responsibilities

• Lead detailed solution design across services, APIs, event integrations, data persistence, security, and deployment.
• Write and review code, build POCs and spikes, validate frameworks, troubleshoot issues, set implementation standards.
• Design cloud-native, distributed systems on Azure or AWS, with microservices and serverless patterns; ensure scalability and DR.
• Define API and integration patterns using REST/OpenAPI, API gateways, and event streaming like Kafka/RabbitMQ.
• Drive legacy modernization with strangler patterns and safe coexistence of legacy and new services.
• Define persistence and caching strategies across relational/NoSQL stores and Redis.
• Embed security into designs: IAM, OAuth 2.0/OIDC, encryption and auditability.
• Establish CI/CD, IaC, observability, logging, and production diagnostics practices.
• Collaborate with product owners and architects to translate retirement workflows into designs.
• Mentor engineers, review PRs, drive non-functional requirements, reduce technical debt.

Skills

Java/Spring Boot

Azure

Kubernetes

REST/OpenAPI

Event-driven architecture

Security/IAM

API design

Tools

AKS/EKS

Job description

Bridgenext is seeking a Principal Engineer / Technical Architect with deep hands-on engineering and strong US retirement domain insight to drive architecture and modernization initiatives. You will own detailed design for enterprise modernization across wealth and asset management, review code, and guide engineering teams.

This remote US-based role emphasizes collaboration, scalability, and security. The ideal candidate has 10+ years in software engineering with leadership in large-scale