About Times Internet
At Times Internet, we build premium digital products that simplify and enhance the everyday lives of people.We are India's largest digital products company with a presence in a wide range of categories across news, entertainment, marketplaces, and transactions.Many of our products are market leaders & iconic brands in their own right. TOI, ET, Indiatimes, NBT, and Cricbuzz, among others, are products that bring you closer to your interests and aspirations. We are excited by new possibilities and look forward to bringing new products, ideas, and technologies that help people make the most of every day.
Build a career of purpose & passion with Times Internet.
Designation- Tech Lead – Fintech Lending Product
About the Role
We are building a digital lending product and are looking for a Tech Lead to own its technical foundation end to end. This is a hands-on leadership role: you will architect the platform, write and review production code, guide a team of engineers, and act as the technical authority who works directly with vendors, partners, and regulators. You will balance speed of execution with the rigour that a regulated lending business demands.The right person is senior enough to set direction and negotiate with external partners, yet still deep enough in the code to make sound design decisions and unblock the team.
Key Responsibilities
Architecture & Technical Ownership
- Own the end-to-end architecture of the lending platform — loan origination, underwriting, disbursement, servicing, and collections.
- Design for scale, resilience, and security, with clear service boundaries, well-defined APIs, and event-driven flows where appropriate.
- Make and document key technology decisions (build vs. buy, data stores, integration patterns) and own the technical roadmap.
- Establish engineering standards: code quality, testing, CI/CD, observability, and incident response.
Hands-on Engineering
- Stay close to the code — write, review, and refactor production code for critical paths and complex modules.
- Set the bar through code reviews, pairing, and technical mentorship of a team of engineers.
- Prototype and de-risk new integrations (credit bureaus, payment rails, KYC providers) before committing the team.
Compliance & Risk
- Regulatory awareness: build and operate the platform in line with the RBI (Digital Lending) Directions, 2025 and applicable NBFC norms — direct disbursement to borrower bank accounts, repayments routed to the regulated entity, Key Fact Statement (KFS) and APR disclosures, and reporting of Digital Lending Apps to RBI.
- Data privacy & security: ensure data handling complies with the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act and PCI-DSS for payment data — data localization on Indian servers, consent management, encryption, access controls, and data retention/erasure requirements.
- Partner with risk, legal, and compliance teams to translate regulatory requirements into technical controls and auditable systems.
- Maintain audit readiness: logging, traceability, and documentation that withstand regulatory and partner-bank scrutiny.
Vendor & Stakeholder Management
- Evaluate, select, and manage technology vendors and partners — LSPs, bureaus, KYC/AML providers, payment gateways, and cloud providers.
- Lead technical due diligence, negotiate SLAs, and hold vendors accountable on delivery, security, and uptime.
- Be the technical face of the team in partner-bank and co-lending integrations and in conversations with auditors and regulators.
Must-have Qualifications
- 8–12 years of software engineering experience, with at least 2–3 years in a technical leadership or lead-engineer capacity.
- Proven track record of architecting and shipping production systems at scale, ideally in fintech, lending, payments, or another regulated domain.
- Strong hands-on coding ability in a modern backend stack (e.g., Java/Spring Boot, or Python/Go/Node.js) and solid grasp of SQL/NoSQL data modelling.
- Deep experience with cloud (AWS/GCP/Azure), containers, CI/CD, and building secure, observable, highly available services.
- Working knowledge of fintech compliance — RBI digital lending norms, KYC/AML, data privacy, and secure handling of financial and PII data.
- Experience integrating third-party financial systems: credit bureaus, payment rails, KYC/eKYC, and bank APIs.
- Demonstrated ability to manage vendors and lead technical conversations with external partners.
- Strong communication skills and the ability to mentor engineers and influence cross-functional stakeholders.
Nice-to-haves
- Direct experience building for an NBFC, bank, or RBI-regulated lending entity.
- Familiarity with co-lending / multi-lender arrangements and Default Loss Guarantee (DLG) frameworks.
- Exposure to underwriting, credit risk models, or rule/decision engines.
- Experience with high-volume, low-latency transaction systems and fraud prevention.
What Success Looks Like
- A scalable, secure, and compliant lending platform that ships reliably and passes regulatory and partner audits.
- A high-performing engineering team operating to clear technical standards.
- Vendor and partner integrations delivered on time, with accountable SLAs.
