Job Description

Principal Application Architect CONTRACT - 12 MONTHS - R1200/hour - Join South Africa's leading financial services institution - Johannesburg
This is a fantastic opportunity for a Principal Application Architect to be the lead resource responsible for designing, delivering, and evolving complex, high-scale enterprise systems within South Africa's leading financial services institution.
This Principal Application Architect role is a 12-month independent contract based in Johannesburg with a rate of R1200 per hour.
THE COMPANY
Known as being the TOP SPECIALIZED FINANCIAL SERVICES Company in SA, they offer unrivalled access to the latest technologies as well as providing the possibility for growth, even as a contractor. This is a tremendous opportunity to see this exciting project through from initiation all the way to completion, working with some of the brightest minds in the Financial Services space.
THE ROLE
As Principal Application Architect, you will be responsible for designing, delivering and evolving complex, high-scale enterprise platforms within the company's regulated Insurance and Asset Management environments. You will combine deep technical execution with strategic architecture oversight, guiding cloud-native modernisation, SaaS adoption and consistent architecture across multiple delivery teams.
You will provide end-to-end architectural direction across application, integration, data and security, translating business and regulatory requirements into practical, resilient technical solutions. You will also play a key mentorship and governance role by influencing technical direction, setting standards, and supporting senior engineers & architects across the organisation.
REQUIREMENTS

• Relevant technical degree, or equivalent work experience
• Proven experience in a Principal Architect/Principal Engineer/Senior Application Architect role within large, complex enterprise environments
• Strong background designing and delivering high-scale, business-critical systems in regulated industries (insurance, asset management, banking, or financial services)
• Strong engineering background with practical development in languages such as C#, Java, JavaScript, Python, etc
• Demonstrated success architecting and modernising cloud-native platforms on AWS and/or Azure, including SaaS and distributed systems
• Cloud certifications (AWS/Azure) beneficial

Skills Required