Rapid Application Engineer

Internal Job Level:
Associate

Reports to:

Rapid Application Development Manager

Job Overview

In this role you will be working with the Product, Infrastructure, QA, and Operations teams to solve complex problems ike our Low Latency team who build the exchange engine itself, the RAD (Rapid Application Development) team lives at the intersection of troubleshooting, innovation, and operational efficiency. You’ll be investigating the toughest production issues, validating new trading technology approaches through rapid prototyping, and building the internal tools and test frameworks that keep Aquis running smoothly.

You’ll be part of a small, high-impact team that combines detective work with creative engineering. One day you might help investigate a performance anomaly in one of our trading workflows; the next, you'll be building a utility to help QA stress-test a new feature or writing scripts to analyse performance bottlenecks. You're starting a journey where problems are often ambiguous, priorities shift quickly, and learning from more experienced colleagues will accelerate your growth significantly.

To succeed as a Mid-Level RAD Engineer, you will be a proponent of agile principles and modern software best practices. You can produce clean, well-tested code and collaborate effectively with the development team. Ideally, you will have worked in environments where code reliability and performance matter, whether that's systems programming, embedded systems, or previous experience in critical infrastructure. This role will develop your operational mindset: understanding not just what systems do, but why they fail and how to prevent it.

Responsibilities and Duties

Investigate production issues and platform behaviour: Help diagnose system problems with guidance from senior engineers; work to create reproducible test cases and diagnostic frameworks that validate root causes; learn to identify patterns and root causes; document findings clearly so the broader team can learn.

Support rapid prototyping efforts: Implement features and approaches in POC code; write clean, testable code even under time pressure; validate technical approaches and gather feedback for the Product team.

Build tools and utilities for internal teams: Develop test utilities, diagnostic scripts and monitoring tools that help Operations and QA teams work more effectively and validate fixes reliably.

Code, test, integrate, and document software
:
Produce high-quality code with appropriate test coverage; participate in code review; maintain clear documentation and commit messages.

Learn the platform and systems architecture
:
Actively invest in understanding how Aquis' market data, order matching, and trading workflows operate; build mental models of system behaviour so you can spot anomalies.

Apply computer science fundamentals
:
Use your understanding of algorithms, data structures, networking, and systems design to break down complex problems.

Escalate appropriately and ask for guidance
:
Work independently but recognize when issues need senior involvement; leverage your team's expertise.

Skills and Experience

Essential

• 4+ years professional C++ development experience (C++11 or later), in any domain, e.g. finance, systems, embedded, or other high-performance contexts.
• Comfortable working with core networking concepts: TCP, UDP, multicast
• Linux experience: Able to navigate Linux systems, use common debugging tools, and understand basic system concepts (processes, file descriptors, memory, etc.).
• Python, Git, and SQL
  :
  Comfortable writing scripts, using version control, and querying data.
• Kanban and CI/CD: Comfortable with Kanban workflow, Jira, continuous integration, and rapid iteration.
• Writing well-tested code and creating reproduction environments: Able to write effective test cases, establish diagnostic frameworks, and set up reproducible environments that help isolate and validate fixes for complex issues.
• Analytical mindset: You enjoy investigating "why" something happened and can break down complex systems into understandable pieces.
• A genuine desire to learn trading technology: Curiosity about how financial markets work and how exchange technology fits into that ecosystem.
• Team player mentality: You collaborate well, give and receive feedback gracefully, and take initiative without needing constant direction.
• Comfortable using AI tools in development: Familiar with LLMs, coding assistants, and AI-powered tools for writing code, debugging, generating tests, and exploring…