Lead Python Engineer

Job title: Python Lead / Lead Python Engineer Location: Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India Employment type: Full-time Experience: 10+ years Joining preference: Immediate joiners or candidates with a very short notice period.

About the Role

We are looking for a highly experienced, hands-on Python Lead to drive technical feasibility. application architecture, backend development, and end-to-end product delivery. This is a player-coach role combining hands-on Python engineering with technical leadership. You will evaluate new product ideas, build proof of concepts (PoCs), make architecture decisions, lead a team of engineers, and take applications from feasibility to production.

Key Responsibilities

Conduct technical feasibility studies, PoCs, and build-versus-buy evaluations. Prepare feasibility reports with effort estimates, costs, risks, and go/no-go recommendations. Design scalable, secure, and maintainable Python applications and REST APIs. Develop backend services using Python and frameworks such as FastAPI, Django, or Flask.

Own application architecture, code quality, performance optimization, and production releases. Work with PostgreSQL / MySQL, Redis / MongoDB, task queues, and message brokers. Manage cloud deployments, Docker, CI/CD pipelines, monitoring, and production operations. Lead, mentor, and guide a team of 3–6 engineers. Drive code reviews, sprint planning, technical documentation, and engineering best practices.

Collaborate with the Founder / CTO and stakeholders to ensure timely product delivery.

Requirements

Mandatory Skills 10+ years of overall software engineering experience. 6+ years of hands-on production experience with Python 3.x. Strong experience with FastAPI, Django, or Flask and REST API development. Experience designing and delivering at least two production systems end to end. Proven experience in technical feasibility studies and PoCs.

Strong database knowledge: PostgreSQL or MySQL, plus Redis or MongoDB. Experience with Celery / RQ or equivalent task queues and RabbitMQ / Kafka / SQS. Production experience with AWS / Azure / GCP, Docker, and CI/CD. Hands-on experience with pytest, code quality tools, and Python type checking. Knowledge of application security, OAuth2 / JWT, OWASP Top 10, and access control.

At least 2 years of experience leading 3+ engineers. Strong communication, problem-solving, estimation, and delivery ownership skills. Good-to-Have Skills GenAI / LLM integrations, OpenAI / Anthropic APIs, RAG, and vector databases. Applied cryptography, key management, and secure licensing mechanisms. Kubernetes, Terraform, Prometheus, Grafana, and OpenTelemetry.

React / Next.js familiarity and performance optimization using Rust, Cython, or Go. Experience taking products from concept to production and first customers.