Chief Technology Officer

Chief Technology Officer (CTO) – Digital Asset & FintechLocation: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (On-site, ADGM)Company: Changer.ae LimitedEmployment Type: Full-timeAbout Changer.aeChanger.ae is an institutional-grade virtual asset financial services firm and custodian regulated by the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA). Based in Abu Dhabi, Changer provides secure digital asset custody, OTC liquidity, and real-time crypto-to-fiat merchant settlement infrastructure.Role SummaryWe are seeking an exceptionally hands-on Chief Technology Officer (CTO) who is a builder, software engineer, and systems auditor at heart. This is not an administrative, delegative, or high-level vendor-management role.As CTO, you may be required to personally architect, write, review, and audit the code and cloud infrastructure that powers Changer’s institutional digital asset custody, core matching engines, and banking integration rails. You must be comfortable opening the IDE, reviewing raw Pull Requests, writing POCs, auditing Solidity contracts, and inspecting Kubernetes/Terraform configurations directly.Key Responsibilities1. Hands-On Software Engineering & ArchitectureDirect Systems Coding: Personally write, optimize, and maintain critical-path microservices for Changer’s core swap engine, ledger balances, and payment processing pipelines.Precision Math & Ledger Audit: Enforce strict precision handling across all codebases—ensuring 100% elimination of floating-point math in financial routines.Code Reviews & PR Approval: Act as the final gatekeeper for code deployments. Conduct rigorous, line-by-line code reviews for performance, concurrency safety, and security vulnerabilities.2. Web3, Custody & Smart Contract VerificationSmart Contract & Signature Auditing: Review and audit Web3 smart contracts (EIP-712 typed signature parsing, ERC-20 interaction, router logic) and verify on-chain transaction verification mechanics.Institutional Key Security: Personally inspect and verify MPC/HSM key topology setups and hot/warm/cold wallet segregation rules to ensure full compliance with ADGM FSRA Safe Custody rulebooks.KYT & Travel Rule Inspection: Inspect raw API integration payloads for enterprise transaction monitoring/risk scoring engines and ensure FATF/IVMS101 Travel Rule data associations are correctly executed.3. Banking Rails & API ImplementationDirect Banking Integrations: Inspect, debug, and verify backend handlers connecting to partner bank APIs and local payment clearing rails and automated Virtual IBAN routing.API/SDK Engineering: Hands-on development and verification of lightweight B2B checkout SDKs and REST/WebSocket APIs, guaranteeing seamless integration for enterprise merchants.4. Infrastructure, DevSecOps & Security AuditingBare-Metal & Cloud Inspection: Directly audit and verify AWS infrastructure configurations (EKS, Terraform scripts, Docker containers, multi-AZ networking) to maintain 99.99% system availability.Hands-On Security Verification: Inspect firewall rules, zero-trust access policies, and encryption key management setups; lead technical proof verification for ISO 27001 and ADGM FSRA regulatory audits.Practical AI Engineering: Personally integrate modern AI tooling (LLM APIs, automated test generators, log-triage copilots) directly into CI/CD pipelines to streamline engineering output.5. Technical Leadership (Leading by Code)Engineering Mentorship: Lead through technical excellence and pair programming rather than administrative management, setting the gold standard for clean code, unit testing, and system design.Zero Overhead Management: Eliminate unnecessary management layers by maintaining direct oversight of git workflows, automated testing pipelines, and live deployment verification.Candidate QualificationsHard Technical RequirementsDirect Programming Mastery: Fluency in at least two core backend languages (Go, Node.js/TypeScript, Python, C++, Rust, Solidity etc) with the ability to pass live coding, concurrency, and architecture assessments during the interview process.Hands-On Web3 & Cryptography: Proven ability to cryptographically verify signatures (secp256k1, ecrecover), inspect EVM smart contract logic, and debug raw Web3 RPC calls without relying on third-party abstractions.Cloud & Infrastructure Engineering: Hands-on expertise writing Terraform scripts, managing AWS EKS clusters, configuring ingress controllers, and debugging live production container logs.System & Code Auditing: Demonstrated history of personally conducting security code audits, finding memory leaks, concurrency locks, or precision errors in production systems.Database & Ledger Engineering: Mastery of PostgreSQL/SQL database design, ACID compliance, parameterized queries, and immutable audit trail logging.Perferered Experience8+ years of total software engineering experience, with at least 3+ years in a hands-on senior technical leadership role (CTO, VP of Engineering, Lead Architect) within crypto exchanges, digital asset custodians, or regulated payment gateways.Direct Experience in Regulated Environments: Working knowledge of technical requirements under ADGM FSRA, VARA, CBUAE, MAS, HKMA, or FCA.Zero "Delegation-Only" Mindset: Strong passion for remaining a hands-on engineer who takes pride in system stability, clean architecture, and direct code verification.AI-Augmented Engineering: Proven experience integrating modern AI toolchains (e.g., LLM APIs, autonomous coding copilots, and AI-driven static analyzers) directly into developer workflows to accelerate feature delivery, automate unit test generation, and streamline smart contract auditing.AI for Security & Tooling: Hands-on ability to build and deploy practical AI-assisted internal tooling—such as automated contract vulnerability scanning, real-time log triage, and automated KYT anomaly detection pipelines.Proven "Zero-to-One" Track Record: Demonstrated history of personally architecting, coding, and launching production-grade digital asset, core exchange, or payment infrastructure completely from scratch—not just maintaining existing legacy systems.Greenfield Systems Delivery: Full-lifecycle experience taking complex financial/Web3 products from initial git repository initialization, architecture whiteboard, and CI/CD setup all the way to mainnet deployment, production scaling, and regulatory audit approval.