Senior Backend Developer

About Us:

Cresset provides solutions for chemists in world-leading research organisations to discover, design, optimise, synthesise and track the best small molecules. We help them reach better design and synthesis decisions, faster and more efficiently, enabling them to win the race to success in industries including pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, flavours and fragrances.

We are looking for a Senior Backend Developer to drive the development of state-of-the-art cloud services and APIs for drug design and data analysis within the pharmaceutical industry. This role combines hands-on software development with technical leadership, helping to shape software architecture, product specifications and project delivery.

You'll love this role if you are:

Passionate about developing exceptional applications and solving complex technical problems.

Someone who enjoys taking ownership of projects and delivering high-quality software with minimal supervision.

A collaborative developer who enjoys sharing knowledge, mentoring others and working across functional areas.

Interested in evaluating new technologies and staying current with industry developments.

Comfortable making technical decisions and helping guide the technical direction of products and services.

What you'll be doing:

Develop drug discovery cloud services, APIs and web applications using Python backend services including FastAPI and Django.

Design and build reliable REST APIs and services for applications, automated pipelines and AI workflows.

Deliver complex software projects with minimal supervision and take ownership of active projects at an early stage.

Use AI coding assistants thoughtfully, ensuring AI-generated code meets the same standards of review, testing and verification as all other code.

Make architectural decisions and guide technical direction to build scalable, highly available systems.

Contribute to the deployment, hosting, monitoring and operation of cloud services in production, working closely with DevOps colleagues.

Champion software engineering best practices including testing, CI/CD, code review and documentation.

Mentor other developers and share knowledge across functional areas.

Identify and implement continuous improvements that reduce technical debt and improve maintainability and delivery speed.

Communicate complex technical concepts and technical decisions effectively with colleagues, senior leaders, collaborators and customers.

Work within an Agile environment, contributing to user story refinement, estimation and technical delivery.

What we're looking for:

Essential

Demonstrable commercial software development experience, including Python backend services.

Product development experience using technologies such as FastAPI, Django, Git, Linux environments and containerised deployment with Docker and AWS.

Experience designing and building production REST APIs, including API contracts, versioning and documentation.

Experience of testing methodologies including unit, integration, system and end-to-end testing, alongside continuous integration practices.

Strong understanding of system design, including distributed, scalable and highly available architectures.

Practical experience using AI coding assistants, with sound judgement on how to use them safely and effectively.

Strong passion and desire to develop exceptional applications.

Advocate of contemporary software development best practices.

Effective communication and interpersonal skills, including experience mentoring other developers.

Degree-level qualification or equivalent industrial experience.

A commitment to the Cresset values of Integrity, Excellence and Collaboration.

Desirable

Infrastructure-as-code and DevOps experience.

Experience with scientific, research or life-sciences software, or integrating long-running computational workloads.

Front-end development experience using TypeScript and Vue.js.

Experience with SaaS service hosting and operations, including observability, security and cost management.

Some of our benefits:

Hybrid working for most roles

Modern rural offices, with a free shuttle to and from Royston station (twice weekly)

Electric car salary sacrifice scheme and on-site charging

Free parking, covered cycle storage, cycle-to-work scheme and showers

Private health insurance with Vitality

Free on-site lunches (twice weekly)

Two paid volunteering days each year

Annual discretionary bonus scheme

Life assurance

Lifestyle rewards and social activities

Employee Assistance Programme

One more thing…

We are committed to building an inclusive and collaborative culture, aligned to our values.

Applications from candidates of all backgrounds and experiences are welcomed. If you meet most, but not all, of the requirements, we still encourage you to apply, as you may be the right fit for this role.

We are proud to be accredited by the Good Business Charter. What this means for our employees is that we are committed to ensuring a real living wage, fairer hours and contracts, employee wellbeing, employee representation and diversity and inclusion.