HIVED operates a 100% electric e-commerce parcel network using e-cargo bikes/vans, HIVEDmind, an AI-powered platform integrating retailers, warehouses and drivers for routing, live tracking, ETAs and dashboards.
ABOUT HIVED 📦 At HIVED, we’re steamrolling forward as one of Europe’s fastest growing startups, and our momentum shows no signs of slowing. Based in London, we are a climate and logistics start-up building the first sustainable parcel delivery network at scale, powered by a 100% electric fleet. In an ever-growing industry where unreliable service has long been the norm, HIVED has been built from the ground-up to meet the demands of modern consumers and disrupt parcel delivery. A tech company at heart, our talent and technology is laser-focused on delivering the best possible delivery experience for end-customers and meeting the needs of our retail partners. From our drivers to our data engineers, we are constantly working to improve this customer experience that makes us deliver better. Already trusted by leading international brands such as John Lewis, Nespresso, Uniqlo, H&M brands and more, we are solidifying our position as the leaders in Europe to tackle this growing market. Our tight-knit team is made up of ex-Revolut, Bain, HelloFresh, ASOS, Apple and Google employees, and we are backed by some of Europe’s leading investors and VCs in climate-tech, logistics and mobility including Planet A Ventures https://planet-a.com/, Maersk Growth https://www.maersk.com/growth, Pale Blue Dot VC https://sifted.eu/articles/pale-blue-dot-vc-87m-fund/, Eka Ventures https://techcrunch.com/2021/07/12/eka-ventures-closes-95m-impact-vc-fund-for-sustainable-consumption-healthcare-and-society/, NordicNinja VC https://nordicninja.com/ and the British government. We’re passionate about driving innovation and redefining the future of delivery. ROLE OVERVIEW 📝 We are looking for a Lead Engineer to take ownership of one of HIVED’s highest-impact technical domains: the planning pipeline that powers supply-demand matching, parcel distribution, and routing optimisation. As part of HIVED’s Routing Squad, you’ll lead the team tackling some of the most complex and intellectually demanding problems in computer science — building systems that decide how parcels move through the city efficiently, reliably, and at scale. This is a rare opportunity to combine deep engineering expertise, optimisation thinking, and real-world domain understanding to shape a core strategic advantage for HIVED. You’ll own the technical direction of the squad, set a high bar for engineering quality, and lead a team of engineers working closely with data scientists, analysts, product, and operations. Your work will have a direct and visible impact: better routing, stronger planning capabilities, more efficient operations, and a delivery network you can see improving in the city around you. WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING 🚀 - Lead the Routing Squad across technical strategy, delivery, team leadership, and execution of squad goals. - Own the technical direction for systems supporting routing optimisation, supply-demand matching, parcel distribution, forecasting, and planning. - Translate business priorities and operational needs into clear technical strategy, measurable outcomes, and pragmatic execution plans. - Guide architecture and system design for scalable, reliable, production-grade optimisation and planning systems. - Work closely with optimisation engineers, backend engineers, data scientists, analysts, product, and operational stakeholders to turn complex problems into shipped solutions. - Lead the exploration and evaluation of new approaches across routing, scheduling, optimisation, forecasting, and distributed systems. - Set and uphold a high engineering bar through technical reviews, architectural guidance, mentoring, and accountability for maintainable software. - Manage, coach, and develop engineers in the squad, including hiring, performance management, development planning, and resourcing. - Foster a culture of curiosity, ownership, high performance, and continuous learning within the team. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR 🔎 - 5+ years of software engineering experience, including backend or distributed systems development. - Experience leading engineers, either as a people manager or as a senior technical leader with meaningful ownership over team delivery. - Proven ability to translate complex, ambiguous business or operational problems into robust technical solutions. - Strong system design and architectural skills in distributed, production-grade environments. - An appetite for hard optimisation problems — especially routing, scheduling, forecasting, supply-demand matching, or other constraint-heavy domains. - Strong analytical thinking and the ability to combine technical depth with practical judgement. - A track record of setting high engineering standards and helping teams consistently meet them. - Experience working cross-functionally with product, operations, data scientists, analysts, and senior leadership. - Strong ownership mindset: you care about the strategy, the system, the team, and the real-world outcome. Nice to have: - Experience with routing, scheduling, optimisation, forecasting, logistics, mobility, or marketplace systems. - Experience productionising algorithms, solvers, models, or data-heavy decision systems. - Familiarity with optimisation techniques such as linear/integer programming, constraint programming, heuristics, or solver-based approaches. - Experience working in a fast-scaling operational environment where software has a direct physical-world impact. TECHNOLOGIES WE USE 💻 - Backend languages: Python, Go - Tech infrastructure: AWS, CDK TypeScript, Lambda, SQS, EventBridge, RDS, DynamoDB - Data tooling: GCP, BigQuery, Looker, Looker Studio - Observability: Loki, Tempo, Grafana, Prometheus - Event-driven architecture and domain-driven design OUR INTERVIEWING PROCESS 🪜 - Intro call with the hiring manager - Live coding challenge solving a problem - A take home case study, followed by a discussion - On-site inter