Software Backend Engineer - Java / Kafka (all genders)

THE ROLE & THE TEAM At Zalando, we combine startup energy with the scale of an industry leader, powered by an international team from 140+ nations. We believe diverse perspectives lead to sharper thinking and better results, encouraging everyone to raise the bar, take ownership, innovate and bring their authentic selves to work. Zalando Bucharest is our newest site, playing a vital role in optimising our AI-driven infrastructure and driving operational efficiency alongside our Berlin headquarters. We’re looking for professionals who thrive on continuous improvement, automation and collaborative problem-solving to help us deliver exceptional customer experiences at scale. As a Software Engineer in the ERP Engineering department, you are part of the central Zalando Technology Foundation (ZTF), which supports a variety of Zalando business areas. Our team builds and operates the integration backbone that connects SAP with the wider Zalando ecosystem. As a Software Engineer, you contribute hands-on to the solutions we build and operate. You develop and maintain our data integration pipelines, keep a close eye on their health in production, and help ensure they run reliably day to day. You'll grow your skills alongside an experienced team and contribute to the ongoing success of our ERP Engineering department. INCLUSIVE BY DESIGN If you think you have what it takes, we encourage you to apply even if you don't meet every single requirement. You may just be the right candidate for this or other roles! At Zalando, our vision is to be the leading European technology platform for fashion and lifestyle – one that thrives on diversity and is truly inclusive by design. We believe that diverse teams fuel innovation and creativity. We actively seek out talent from all backgrounds and try to reduce bias in our hiring and employment processes, focusing on your qualifications, skills and contributions. To support this, we kindly ask that you refrain from including personal details such as your photo, age or marital status in your CV, ensuring a fair and equitable evaluation based solely on your abilities and potential. We are committed to providing an exceptional and accessible candidate experience for everyone. If you require any accommodations to support you throughout the hiring process, please let us know – we are here to assist you. Discover more about our commitment to creating a diverse and inclusive workplace: WHAT WE'D LOVE YOU TO DO (AND LOVE DOING) Build and maintain efficient, reliable transactional data integration solutions Monitor our data pipelines and integrations, proactively spotting and resolving issues to keep them running smoothly in production Develop and maintain RESTful APIs and event-driven integrations to ensure seamless data exchange between applications and services Support the day-to-day operations and maintenance of our services, including troubleshooting and performance improvements Collaborate with cross-functional and platform teams to identify and address system integration challenges. WE'D LOVE TO MEET YOU IF… 4+ years of hands-on experience in Java programming Solid experience with the Spring framework (or a comparable Java ecosystem); experience with Spring Batch is a plus Experience building and maintaining RESTful APIs and integration solutions Hands-on experience with Kafka or a similar distributed streaming/event framework Experience with Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) processes Proficiency with databases such as PostgreSQL, including writing and tuning queries Strong expertise in unit testing and test-driven development Familiarity with "infrastructure as code" best practices and tools Familiarity with AWS and Kubernetes (K8s) is considered an advantage Good communication skills with the ability to adapt to different contexts and audiences Team player mentality with a willingness to share knowledge within teams If you think you have what it takes, we encourage you to apply even if you don't meet every single requirement. You may just be the right candidate for this or other roles! OUR OFFER Experience the financial backing, market stability and massive operational structure of the leading European technology platform for fashion and lifestyle, combined with the autonomy, agility and risk-taking spirit of a founder. Work on a scale where your daily technical choices, architecture decisions and code deployment directly shape the experience of over 60 million active users across Europe. Our open and collaborative tech radar is a shared platform that inspires our teams to pick the best technologies for new projects, reflect on technical decisions and continuously evolve our software development landscape. Drive your development through our training platform and biannual peer-to-peer review.