About This Role
We're seeking a visionary CTO to lead CoffeeGrab's technical strategy as we scale from thousands to millions of coffee orders. You'll build and mentor our engineering team, make critical architecture decisions, and ensure our platform can handle the morning coffee rush across multiple countries. This is a hands-on leadership role where you'll balance coding with strategic planning, working directly with our founders to shape the future of coffee ordering. You'll own our technical roadmap, drive innovation, and build the systems that will make CoffeeGrab the default coffee app across New Zealand, Australia, and the UK.
What You'll Do
Define and execute the technical strategy, making architecture decisions that will scale to millions of users and thousands of cafesBuild and mentor a world-class engineering team, establishing culture, processes, and best practices for sustainable growthOwn critical technical decisions around infrastructure, choosing between build vs buy, and selecting technologies that balance speed with scalabilityLead system architecture for real-time ordering, payment processing, and multi-merchant complexity while ensuring 99.9% uptimeImplement robust analytics and monitoring systems to track performance, user behaviour, and system health across all platformsDrive technical innovation including AI-powered features, predictive ordering, and cafe partner tools that differentiate CoffeeGrabManage technical partnerships and vendor relationships including Firebase, Stripe, AWS, and potential POS system integrationsBalance technical excellence with business needs, making pragmatic decisions that ship features quickly while maintaining qualityWhat We're Looking For
8+ years of software development experience with at least 3 years in technical leadership roles at startupsProven track record scaling systems from thousands to millions of users, ideally in marketplaces, food tech, or real-time applicationsDeep expertise across mobile (iOS/Android), backend, and cloud infrastructure with hands-on experience in our stack (Firebase, Stripe)Experience building and leading engineering teams from 2-20+ people, including hiring, mentoring, and establishing engineering cultureStrong understanding of real-time systems, payment processing, and the unique challenges of multi-merchant platformsData-driven approach to decision making with experience implementing analytics, A/B testing, and monitoring at scaleExcellent communication skills to translate technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders and investorsStartup DNA - comfortable with ambiguity, rapid iteration, and wearing multiple hats while building something from the ground up
