Backend Engineer
About us
Founded in Sydney in 2014, ezyCollect by Sidetrade is Australia's leading Order-to-Cash platform for small and mid-sized businesses. We automate credit management, collections, and payments - taking the manual work out of getting paid. Our 1,100+ customers manage A$19 billion in receivables through the platform, typically cutting late payments by 40% and bad debt by 80% within three months.
Now part of global AI leader Sidetrade, we're scaling our reach across three continents - bringing enterprise-grade technology to the mid-market while staying true to our Sydney roots. Australian innovation. Global ambition.
Why this role exists
We're transitioning from a traditional SaaS company to an AI-first platform. You'll be working with cutting-edge AI models, evaluating emerging technologies (like AI calling solutions), and making architectural decisions about which tools and models to integrate. The technical challenges are real: modernising legacy code, designing scalable microservices, and pushing the boundaries of what AI can do in the fintech space.
Your team
You'll join the Platypus team - a lean, autonomous engineering team responsible for both integrations and AI-powered workflows.
This team focuses on two key areas:
- Integrations domain: Building 2-3 new integrations per year - connectors that pull data from external systems into ezyCollect, expanding our platform's capabilities.
- AI & Business Insights domain: Developing augmented workflows and laying the groundwork for AI agents that can read through emails, automate tasks, and surface intelligent business insights for our users.
What you'll be doing
Shape the product, not just the code. You'll partner directly with Sales, Customer Success, and leadership to understand requirements, clarify problems, and define scope. Engineers rotate leading design sessions - creating lightweight design docs, making architectural trade-offs, and breaking projects into shippable milestones. You write the tickets.
Own features end-to-end. From design to deployment to production support. Write clean, well-tested code across our Spring microservices. Build infrastructure with Terraform. Ship confidently using feature flags, CI/CD (CircleCI), and progressive delivery. Monitor what you ship - metrics, logs, root-cause analysis, and post-mortems with real follow-through.
Work with high autonomy. Choose your tech stack. Make architectural decisions. Use DevOps modules but write your own infrastructure code when needed. You're a 360° engineer, not just a code writer.
Embrace AI-first development. Everyone has Codex and ChatGPT subscriptions, and we expect you to use them to their full potential. We're not talking autocomplete - we want you building 80%+ of your code with AI assistance, evaluating emerging AI models, and making smart decisions about which technologies to integrate.
Communicate like a pro. Share async updates, demo your work, and keep stakeholders unblocked. If you're working on integrations, expect a significant support component - troubleshooting issues and ensuring smooth customer experiences.
Note: The Platypus team has no dedicated QA or Product Owner. You own quality, define acceptance criteria, and ship with confidence.
What you'll bring
You're a backend engineer with 4+ years of experience shipping production code in Java and Spring Boot. You've built microservices and event-driven systems on AWS (Lambda, S3, SQS, RDS), and you design with scalability, resilience, and security in mind from day one.
Bonus points for FinTech/SaaS experience, modular API design, workflow tools (Temporal, Step Functions), modern auth patterns, or Kubernetes.
Beyond the tech stack, you write clean code, communicate openly, juggle competing priorities, and make data-driven decisions - ownership and craft matter as much as your skills.
Our tech stack
- Languages: Java 8/7, JavaScript, Python, typescript
- Frameworks: Spring Boot (latest), React
- Database: MySQL, AWS Aurora
- AWS & Infrastructure: Lambda, S3, RDS, EC2, SQS, EKS (Kubernetes)
- Infrastructure as Code: Terraform (currently migrating to this)
- Code Deployment: CircleCi, GoCD, Python scripts (automated and semi-automated)
- Microservices Communication: REST APIs, HTTP, SQS (mix of synchronous and asynchronous event-based communication)
- Monitoring & Observability: Datadog, Grafana, AWS CloudWatch
- Development Tools: IntelliJ IDEA, Git, Jira
Why join now?
Be part of the AI transformation. We're not just adding AI features - we're rebuilding the platform AI-first. You'll work on greenfield projects with modern tech while having the stability of an established company backed by a global leader.
Real autonomy and ownership. Make architectural decisions, choose your tools, and own features from conception to production. This isn't just talking - we have no PO or QA on the team because engineers own it all.
Grow fast. With Sidetrade's backing and our expansion across three continents, there's a genuine upward trajectory here. High performers who deliver in the first few months will have opportunities to lead domains, mentor others, and shape the future of the platform.
Steady revenue, ambitious goals. We're profitable with 1,100+ customers and A$19B under management. You're not joining a startup scrambling for product-market fit - you're joining a company already scaling fast.
What we offer
Work that fits your life: Hybrid working (3 days in office), work-from-anywhere policy, generous parental leave, and flexible leave when life happens.
Level up your skills: Annual training budget, dedicated coaching, and exposure to multiple facets of the business (sales, CS, product) that accelerates your growth.
Modern workspace: 24/7 access to our WeWork office on Pitt Street with on-site barista and bar, plus optional active lunch breaks, meditation, and yoga sessions.
Connect and recharge: Quarterly team social events, monthly virtual entertainment, and a collaborative culture that rewards the right behaviours.
Additional perks: Employee referral bonuses and the chance to work with a product customers genuinely love.