Senior Backend Engineer

Job Title: Senior Backend Engineer

Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Language: English

FTE: Full-time, Hybrid (3 days per week in the office)

Employment type: Initial Fixed-Term contract for 12 month

About Newzoo:

Newzoo is the global leader in PC and console games data, empowering companies to make confident strategic and operational decisions. With 17 years of expertise, Newzoo provides best-in-class proprietary data through a platform offering game-level metrics, gamer insights, market intelligence, and storefront data. Trusted by 80% of the top game developers and publishers, Newzoo is the most quoted and reliable source for PC and console gaming insights.

About you: 

You care about problem-solving more than about technology for its own sake. You're happy working in a stable, well-understood stack because you'd rather spend your cognitive budget on the problem than on the plumbing. You ask why before you ask how. You take reliability personally. When something breaks, you want to understand it, not just patch it.

You don't need to be a gamer. You do need to be genuinely interested in working on hard data problems. Ours happen to live in the gaming industry.

About the role:

You'll join our Engineering team as a senior individual contributor, working across the full backend surface. That means the services and APIs that power our products, the infrastructure that keeps them running, and the data collection pipelines that feed them. What you focus on in any given week follows where the business needs you most. Backend feature work when product is shipping. Pipeline work when we're onboarding a new data source. Infrastructure work when we're hardening something for scale.

This is an individual contributor role. You'll have real technical ownership and a seat at the table for architectural decisions.

Because this is a senior role, it is best suited to people who have already owned production backend systems and data pipelines at meaningful scale. If your experience is primarily front-end, academic, or limited to smaller internal tools without ownership of production systems, this role is unlikely to be the right fit at this stage.

Your responsibilities:

• Design and build the backend services and APIs that power our analytics platform and client-facing products
• Own and evolve the data collection pipelines that ingest millions of data points daily from gaming platforms and partners
• Improve reliability, observability, performance and cost efficiency across our infrastructure
• Make architectural decisions that stand up for years, not quarters
• Raise the quality of the engineers around you through code review, technical discussion and pairing
• Use AI-assisted development fluently (Claude Code, Cursor) as a core part of how you ship

Our stack

We're a Python shop and we're deliberate about it. Flask, SQLAlchemy, PostgreSQL, BigQuery, dbt, Airflow, Kubernetes on GCP. Our stack is stable because our job is to ship reliable value to clients, not to chase framework trends. If you read that list and thought "boring", this role probably isn't for you. If you read it and thought "good, I can focus on the actual problem", keep reading.

Your profile:

• 8+ years building and operating production Python services
• Deep fluency with Flask (or equivalent) and RESTful API design
• Deep understanding of how analytical data stores actually work. Knowing SQL isn't enough. You think about storage layout, scan patterns and cost before writing the query. Production BigQuery experience, plus PostgreSQL for the transactional side
• Real experience designing and running data pipelines and ETL workflows at meaningful scale
• Track record with high-availability systems. You know what it takes to keep something up, and more importantly, to sense when it's about to fall over
• Comfortable with modern CI/CD and version control practice
• Fluent with AI-assisted development tools. This is table stakes in 2026, not a nice-to-have
• Commitment to testing and operational rigour
• Have the right to work in The Netherlands.
• Ability to work hybrid from Amsterdam office, 3 days per week on Tuesdays, Wednesdays & Thursdays. 

Nice to have:

• Kubernetes and containerised deployment
• Task queues (Celery or equivalent)
• Experience with gaming platform APIs (Xbox, PlayStation, Steam, Nintendo, Epic)
• dbt at multi-terabyte scale
• You play games yourself or follow the games industry closely. Not required, but it helps when you're talking shop with colleagues and clients

Please note:

• You must have the right to work in the The Netherlands.

Our offer:

• Join an Ambitious Team: Be part of a young, energetic team with endless opportunities to grow within the company.
• Hybrid Work Setup: Enjoy the flexibility of working from our Amsterdam office or home, with work-from-home reimbursements, internet reimbursement, travel reimbursement, and catered lunch in the office.
• Summer Hours: Enjoy reduced working hours during the summer period.
• Flexible National Holidays: Swap national holidays for the days that matter most to you.
• Additional Holidays: Purchase extra days off at 50% of the cost, on top of your standard holiday allowance.
• Work from Anywhere: Freedom to work from another country for up to 6 weeks every year.
• Industry Leaders: Collaborate directly with industry leaders, shaping the future of games, hardware, media, and tech.
• Fun Culture: Experience a fast-paced, collaborative, fun-loving, and transparent culture.
• Personal Development: Benefit from a personal development budget of €1500, plus tools and opportunities to grow your career.
• Awesome Team Events: Enjoy team outings, in-office celebrations, and more.
• Health & Wellness: Access a physical activity budget.
• Mental Wellness: Get unlimited access to mental wellness support through OpenUp.
• Pension Plan: We invest in your future with a comprehensive pension plan.
• Salary range: €68,850 - €77,000 gross per year.
  • We aim to pay competitively based on the market in the Netherlands.
  • Final compensation will be determined based on your experience, skills, and overall fit for the role.
• And More: There's always more to discover!
  

Hiring steps:

1. Application Submission: Send us your resume and cover letter to kickstart your journey with us! We value authenticity and genuine interest in the role. In your cover letter, please answer this question: In 2 to 3 sentences, how would you start investigating a 30% week-over-week spike in our BigQuery costs? We're not looking for a "right" answer. We're looking for how you think. Use AI tools if you want to (we do), just make sure the reasoning is yours.
2. Screening Call (30 minutes): We'll have a friendly chat to get to know you better and discuss your fit for the role.
3. First Interview with Hiring Manager (30 minutes): Meet with the hiring manager to dive deeper into your experience and skills.
4. In-person Technical Assessment (total: 2 hours 30 minutes): You’ll meet a hiring manager and another team member for a coding, architecture, and design assessment (2 hours), followed by a 30-minute cultural fit conversation with members of the Product team.
5. Follow-up Final Interview (30 minutes): If needed, there may be a final conversation with the hiring managers.

Interested?

Please upload your CV/resume and motivation letter explaining why Newzoo, what makes you perfect for this position and your quirks! In your cover letter, please answer this question: In 2 to 3 sentences, how would you start investigating a 30% week-over-week spike in our BigQuery costs? We're not looking for a "right" answer. We're looking for how you think. Use AI tools if you want to (we do), just make sure the reasoning is yours.