Senior Backend Principal Developer: Scalable, Secure APIs

Citi; New York (NY); Hybrid; USD 19,000 - 31,000; Full time

Job summary

Citi is seeking a Senior Backend Principal Developer to lead the design, architecture, and delivery of scalable backend services within Citi's digital platform. The role is hands-on with strong leadership, IAM/SSO, microservices, and cloud-native patterns, collaborating with product, frontend, and infra teams to implement secure, high-performance APIs.

Based in Pune, hybrid work model, opportunity to mentor engineers and drive architectural decisions across a federated system while adhering to

Qualifications

• 8-12 years in backend software development with enterprise-scale platforms.
• Experience as Principal or Lead Developer with technical leadership.
• Expert-level Java backend development and frameworks.
• Distributed systems, microservices, RESTful APIs experience.
• IAM with SSO protocols (OAuth2, OpenID Connect) and fine-grained authorization.
• Cloud-native development, Docker, Kubernetes, GCP and AWS.
• Relational and NoSQL databases knowledge.
• Strong problem-solving and analytical skills.
• Excellent communication and cross-team collaboration.
• Frontend integration: ReactJS, CSP, corporate design system, ADA considerations.

Responsibilities

• Technical vision & leadership for backend development.
• Hands-on design, development, and maintenance of high-performance services.
• Architectural stewardship for scalable, secure federated systems.
• Implement robust security measures including SSO and entitlements.
• Performance engineering with caching strategies and async processing.
• Integration design for Content Provider apps via HTTP-based interfaces.
• Mentorship, code reviews, and best practices adoption.
• Troubleshoot production issues and perform root cause analysis.
• Collaborate with product, frontend, architects, and infra teams.
• Ensure compliance with laws and Citi policies.

Skills

Java backend

Distributed systems

REST APIs

IAM / SSO

Cloud native

Microservices

Security engineering

Frontend integration

Communication skills

Problem solving

Collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Master’s degree preferred

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

ReactJS

Oracle

Caching solutions

Job description

Citi is seeking a Senior Backend Principal Developer to lead the design, architecture, and delivery of scalable backend services within Citi's digital platform. The role is hands-on with strong leadership, IAM/SSO, microservices, and cloud-native patterns, collaborating with product, frontend, and infra teams to implement secure, high-performance APIs.

Based in Pune, hybrid work model, opportunity to mentor engineers and drive architectural decisions across a federated system while adhering to