VP Engineering / CTO

Salary: Basic circa £150,000-£185,000 depending on level and experience, plus bonus, benefits and stock options

The Mission

Azur Technology is evolving into a product led, AI augmented SaaS provider for the MGA (Managing General Agent) market. Following a successful private funding round, we are reimagining how insurance technology is built.

Our flagship product, MGA Connect, is a modern SaaS platform designed to replace legacy, 90s era technology with a lean, highly configurable system.

We are looking for a leader to bridge the gap between our established Salesforce based architecture and a future defined by AI driven development efficiencies - while also owning the broader technology strategy as we scale.

The Role

This is a high impact leadership position for a technical strategist who recognises that AI is fundamentally changing the engineering landscape.

You will lead a global team of 50+ engineers (headquartered in London, with a significant hub in the Philippines), transitioning the culture from traditional development cycles to a high performing, AI enabled operation.

In addition to engineering leadership, this role expands into CTO level accountability - owning platform strategy, technical operations, and security as we scale into a mature SaaS business.

Core Mandate

As we enter a new phase of growth and AI adoption, this role and person will build and run a high performing product engineering organisation that delivers reliably, scales efficiently, and supports the transition to a product led SaaS model.

Key Responsibilities Engineering Leadership & Organisation

• Build and lead a scalable engineering organisation
• Define team structures (squads/pods aligned to product areas)
• Hire, develop, and retain high quality engineering talent
• Establish clear ownership, accountability, and leadership layers

Delivery Excellence & Execution

• Own predictable, high quality delivery
• Implement strong planning and estimation practices
• Establish sprint and release discipline
• Introduce delivery tracking and reporting
• Shift the culture from ad hoc delivery to a repeatable execution engine

Product Engineering Alignment

• Partner closely with Product to align engineering to roadmap and priorities
• Ensure teams are working on reusable, scalable product features
• Drive a mindset shift from client specific builds to productised capabilities

AI Enabled Engineering Transformation

• Embed AI into engineering workflows, including:
  • Developer productivity (copilots, automation)
  • Testing and QA acceleration
  • Documentation and knowledge sharing
• Reduce dependency on linear team scaling
• Evolve towards AI assisted / agentic delivery models
• Stay abreast of changes in the AI landscape and adopt relevant improvements

Quality, Standards & Ways of Working

• Establish and enforce an automation first testing strategy
• Implement strong CI/CD discipline
• Define and uphold code quality standards
• Improve reliability, maintainability, and release confidence

Operational Performance & Metrics

• Define and track key engineering metrics, including:
  • Delivery predictability
  • Cycle time / lead time
  • Deployment frequency
  • Defect rates / quality
• Use data to drive continuous improvement

Technical Operations

• Own the reliability, performance, and scalability of the production platform
• Establish best practices across:
  • Infrastructure management (cloud, environments, cost optimisation)
  • Monitoring, alerting, and incident management
  • Disaster recovery and business continuity planning
• Ensure high availability and resilience of customer facing systems
• Drive DevOps maturity, including environment strategy and release management
• Partner with Engineering and Product to ensure operational readiness for new features
• Balance performance, cost, and scalability as the platform grows

Security & Compliance

• Own the overall security posture of the platform and engineering practices
• Ensure compliance with key frameworks and standards (e.g. SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR)
• Embed security by design principles into architecture and development workflows
• Implement secure SDLC practices, including code scanning and vulnerability management
• Define and enforce data protection, access control, and encryption standards
• Lead incident response and ongoing risk management processes
• Support enterprise client requirements for security assurance and audits
• Balance security, compliance, and delivery speed in a scale up environment

Talent & Capability Strategy

• Partner with People team to hire product oriented engineers (not a services mindset)
• Balance senior talent with effective use of AI/tools
• In conjunction with the people team, help build a culture of ownership, pragmatism, performance and pace.

Key Challenges to Solve

• Lack of delivery predictability and consistency
• Services led ways of working vs product mindset
• Scaling output without linearly increasing headcount
• Embedding AI into real engineering workflows (not just experimentation)
• Building enterprise grade operational and security maturity
• Career growth paths for development team.

Job Requirements Ideal Profile

• VP Engineering / Head of Engineering / CTO experience in a product led SaaS environment
• Experience taking a company from a services led to a product led model, and how to do this right
• Strong operator with a focus on delivery, organisational design, and execution, with the ability todemonstratethis
• Track recordof growing engineering talent in a high performing culture
• Proven experience transforming teams from services led to product led
• Comfortable operating with broad CTO level accountability
• Pragmatic, metrics driven, and AI forward
• Excellent communicator, able to simplify complex ideas and build trust with senior stakeholders
• Commercially minded, with an understanding of how technology decisions affect revenue, cost, and operational performance
• Comfortable operating in a fast moving, high ambiguity scale up environment
• Experience with Salesforce, FSC, and core Apex & LWC
• Experience within the insurance / MGA sector or a highly regulated industry
• Experience implementing or scaling security and compliance frameworks (SOC 2, ISO 27001)

Benefits

• Bonus
• Minimum 25 days' holiday
• Health insurance
• Death in servicePension
• Hybrid and flexible working
• Training budget
• Potential stock options after the qualifying period

Equal Opportunities

We are an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. Employment at Azur Technology is based solely on merit and qualifications directly related to professional competence. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, colour, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age, non disqualifying physical or mental disability, national origin, veteran status, or any other basis covered by applicable law. All employment decisions are based on qualifications, merit, and business need.