PRINCIPAL SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT Own the architecture behind millions of real-time payments – CAPE TOWN

Cape Town - South Africa

Monthly Salary: Not Disclosed

Posted on: 11 hours ago

Vacancies: 1 Vacancy

Job Summary

Job Description

This is an excellent opportunity for a Principal Solutions Architect to take ownership of the architectural direction of a high-scale payments platform bringing clarity standards and long-term direction to systems that process millions of real-time transactions.

This role is based in Cape Town and operates in a hybrid work environment.

THE COMPANY:

This is one of South Africas largest payments platforms delivering a cloud-native solution that processes millions of instant card-free transactions across online in-app and point-of-sale channels. Operating as core financial infrastructure the platform integrates directly with banks payment gateways and enterprise partners in a regulated environment where reliability security and scale are non-negotiable.

THE ROLE:

As Principal Solutions Architect you will establish and own the architectural direction for a large-scale real-time payments platform defining how architecture is practiced and applied across the organisation. Architectural decisions here directly affect stability risk and the platforms ability to scale under regulatory and high-volume constraints.

You will bring structure and consistency to a growing technology landscape setting clear standards and patterns that engineering teams can rely on. The work spans core payment flows platform services and future capabilities requiring strong technical judgement comfort with trade-offs and the ability to influence decisions across product engineering security and compliance while remaining close to the systems themselves.

RESPONSIBILITIES include:

Own the end-to-end solution architecture across core payment platforms and supporting services.
Define architectural standards and patterns that support delivery scale and long-term platform health.
Design and review solutions integrating with banks payment gateways and external platforms.
Translate business and regulatory requirements into clear practical system designs.
Provide architectural oversight on major initiatives guiding design decisions and managing technical risk.
Act as an escalation point for complex architectural and integration challenges.
Balance platform evolution with stability in a high-volume regulated environment.
Partner closely with engineering teams to support delivery without slowing it down.
Contribute to longer-term platform planning as transaction volumes and platform scope grow.

THE REQUIREMENTS:

10 years experience in software engineering and solution architecture with at least 5 years in a senior or principal-level architecture role.
Proven experience designing and evolving large-scale distributed systems operating under real production load.
Strong experience with cloud-native architectures and API-driven platforms.
Experience operating in regulated environments with an understanding of security and regulatory requirements.
Exposure to fintech payments or other transaction-heavy platforms operating at scale.
Ability to balance platform evolution with stability and risk in live systems.

Required Experience:

Staff IC

Job DescriptionThis is an excellent opportunity for a Principal Solutions Architect to take ownership of the architectural direction of a high-scale payments platform bringing clarity standards and long-term direction to systems that process millions of real-time transactions.This role is based in C...