Backend Software Engineer

What do we need

Dotmatics is seeking a Backend Software Engineer with strong Java and/or Scala expertise and hands-on AWS experience to join our agile engineering team. You'll help expand our cloud platform's capabilities, with a growing focus on supporting AI-driven tools and workflows. This role combines core backend development — designing, building, and maintaining robust services — with cloud infrastructure work, as you help build out and operate our AWS-based platform.

This is a hybrid position based in central Auckland. We'd ideally like someone within commuting distance of the city, in-office 1–3 days per week.

You'll join our Geneious team, working on one of the world's leading bioinformatics platforms, used by thousands of organizations — from major pharmaceutical companies to university researchers. Your work will directly support scientists across critical fields, including the development of life-saving therapeutics and vaccines, as well as research into climate change and food security.

In this role you will get to:

• Develop and maintain Geneious cloud products across their various components. Integrating cloud services or writing new ones (mainly in Scala with some Java). If you don’t know Scala, don’t worry, we’ll support you in learning.
• Own what you build end to end. From writing code, packaging it as Docker containers, deploying them to EKS, and running them in production (we practice DevSecOps).
• Collaborate regularly with colleagues and customers to establish requirements and iterate on designs.
• As part of a cross­-functional development team, take on testing, documentation and support when needed.

We are looking for people who have 4+ years of experience in cloud and backend engineering. A Bachelor’s or Advanced Degree in Computer Science or a related field, or equivalent practical experience is required. Knowledge of Biology is not required, as we have a team of scientists who will help you learn. You will be an engineer that prides themselves on getting things done!

The key skills we are looking for are:

• Strong backend engineering skills in Java and/or Scala, including experience with distributed systems and data-intensive applications.
• Hands-on experience with AWS, including services such as EC2, Kubernetes/EKS, Lambda, RDS, S3, VPC, IAM, and CloudWatch.
• Experience designing and implementing cloud-native architectures including containerization, serverless, and managed database services.
• Proficiency with infrastructure as code tools such as Terraform or CloudFormation.

You may also have:

• Comfort using AI coding assistants (e.g. Claude Code) as part of a modern development workflow.
• Experience building backend systems for AI use. E.g. MCP servers and tooling.
• Strong understanding of cloud security, networking, and reliability best practices.
• Experience with observability and monitoring platforms such as Datadog, CloudWatch, or equivalent.
• Familiarity with FinOps practices and cloud cost optimization tooling.