Investment Engineer Platform Engineer

About Abrdn invests in a full range of asset classes from a number of geographies, including Edinburgh, London, Philadelphia, Boston and Singapore. In addition, the business has operations in Japan, India, China and other locations globally. Asset classes covered include equities, bonds, money markets, fund of funds and multi asset funds.

The Modelling and Quantitative Analytics team is a key part of the Investment Team at abrdn. Modelling and Quantitative Analytics is primarily concerned with providing public markets investments teams with tools, data, analysis and analytical support to help deliver investment processes leading to investment decisions and ultimately investment performance for abrdn’s clients. The function is also expected to support the future development of abrdn’s product range, investment processes and overall investment capability.

About The Team: The Investment Engine Platform Engineering team is a horizontal function within the Modelling and Quantitative Analytics team that is responsible for the development of front-office investment management systems to support the Investment Engine (the data, technology, analysis and processes that drive investment decisions). It will enable sophisticated quantitative processes for investment teams in close collaboration with the asset class specific modelling and analytics teams. The team will also form a unit with the Investment Engine Data Engineering team to collaborate with abrdn group IT.

About The Role: The purpose of this role is to develop software and technology solutions as part of the Investment Engine Platform Engineering team. The role will primarily focus on developing and supporting a modern full-stack web application consisting of:

• an ecosystem of microservice REST APIs written in C# (ASP.NET core)
• data persistence via a combination of CosmosDB, RocksDB, blob storage and queue storage
• a library of financial modelling and analytic modules written in Python

The successful candidate is expected to have a mix of software development and general data analytics expertise. A particular focus for the team is to enhance ESG data and analytic capabilities to support sustainable investing across asset classes. This role will primarily focus on a project to develop interactive functionality in the web application enabling investment staff to access a range of ESG analytics to support their investment processes.

Key Responsibilities Include:

• Work autonomously as part of a small agile team to design and develop full-stack software to support the Investment Engine
• Adhering to a consistent development approach (data sets, programming language, visualisation, and user interfaces) to reduce cost, drive efficiency and increase technology governance
• Engage directly with users (portfolio managers and analysts) to understand requirements, get feedback regarding in-flight development and evolve designs in an agile way
• Collaborate with colleagues in the data engineering and quantitative analytics teams to support their development work interacting with the platform
• Working closely with central ESG team to develop platform features that help embed ESG data and analytics into investment processes

To be successful in this role you will need (minimum experience/requirements):

• Three years industry experience of full stack software development, covering user interfaces, back-end development and databases
• Experience working in an agile software development team with a DevOps stack such as GitHub or Azure DevOps
• Experience with creating and managing bespoke data flows, for example data processing pipelines using automation environments
• Familiarity with cloud native architecture, including micro services and distributed design
• Ability to work in an Agile team within a complex environment and gain the support and confidence of a wide variety of stakeholders from across the business
• Interest in, or ideally working knowledge of, investment management based on practical experience. This includes portfolio management, financial theory, mathematical and statistical techniques and their practical and pragmatic application.

Skills:

• Planning and organisation
• Willingness to take responsibility
• Good written and verbal communication skills
• Customer Focus

Qualifications: The role holder is expected to be able to demonstrate a high level of numerical and analytical skill. Ideally the role holder will have an appropriate professional qualification.

Customer Focus – works hard to understand the needs of internal and external customers and tailors approach appropriately.

Preference for action – is proactive and takes the lead in identifying information and opportunities for building positive relationships with key customers.

Achievement Drive – is motivated to get results and is driven to ensure potential of self.

Teamwork – will support others and will build relationships with colleagues within and out with immediate business area.

Communicating and Influencing – enthusiastic when dealing with others and listens to customer needs. Uses a range of influencing tools and techniques to persuade others to act.

Information Gathering – works hard to collate information to ensure full picture is understood and decisions can be made. Must be able to spot trends and anomalies in data.

Professionalism and Business Integrity – is open and honest when dealing with others and presents abrdn in the best way possible.

Creative and Innovative Thinking – considers innovative ways to obtain and present information to customers.

Tenacity/Resilience – Sees barriers as a challenge and will identify ways to overcome challenges.

We are proud to announce that we have officially become a Disability Confident Committed employer. Therefore, if you have a disability and would like to submit an application to one of our UK roles under the Disability Confident Scheme, please notify us by completing the relevant section in our candidate questionnaire and one of our team will reach out to support you through your application process.

Our business: Enabling our clients to be better investors drives everything we do. Our business is structured around three distinct areas – our vectors of growth – focused on our clients’ changing needs.

An inclusive way of working: Whatever way you like to work, if you have the talent and commitment to join our team, we’d like to hear from you. At abrdn we’ve adopted a ‘blended working’ approach. This approach combines the benefits of face-to-face collaboration, coaching and connecting in our offices with the flexibility of working from home. It enables colleagues to find a balance that works for their roles, their teams, our clients and our business, where diverse perspectives drive our actions, is at the core of who we are and what we do.