Senior Database Engineer

Aviation connects our world, brings people together, provides opportunities, accelerates economic growth, and is just so very cool! Come work for NAVBLUE, a leading services company owned by Airbus, dedicated to Flight Operations, Air Traffic Management solutions and services for airlines, airports, and Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs). We combine aircraft manufacturer expertise, flight operations know-how, and agile development to enhance operational efficiency, optimize resources, and increase productivity for a safe and sustainable aviation future. Our global teams deliver a reliable, optimum, and customized user experience to more than 500 customers worldwide.

We are looking for a seasoned Software Engineer with extensive experience in designing, implementing, and optimizing database solutions in a microservices-based environment. As a member of our team, you will contribute to the full lifecycle of our data persistence layer, from schema design and performance tuning to ensuring robust replication, disaster recovery, and seamless integration within our cloud-native microservice ecosystem.

Responsibilities:

• Design & Develop Database Solutions: Architect, design, and implement highly optimized relational (e.g., MySQL, PostgreSQL, AWS Aurora, SQL Server) and NoSQL (e.g., MongoDB, DynamoDB, Redis) database schemas, ensuring data integrity, performance, and scalability for microservices.
• Performance Optimization & Tuning: Proactively analyze and optimize complex queries, implement efficient indexing strategies, and manage partitioning/sharding to ensure peak database performance and handle high throughput.
• Reliability & Disaster Recovery: Design, implement, and maintain robust backup, disaster recovery, and high-availability solutions, including replication (master-slave/multi-master) and failover configurations, to ensure data durability and system uptime.
• Cloud Database Management: Deploy, configure, and manage database instances within cloud infrastructure (e.g., AWS RDS, Aurora), leveraging cloud-native features for scalability and operational efficiency.
• Focus on quality by promoting coding best practices, a test-first mindset and highest security standards.
• Contribute to building new and improving existing development processes.
• Work within small agile teams delivering new features and fixing defects.
• Lead technical designs, taking a holistic view of the product, and collaborate with multiple stakeholders to define the best approach to address upcoming challenges and deliverables.
• Define and drive the team’s technical direction, mentor junior engineers, and proactively identify, propose, and implement new processes or architectural improvements to enhance team efficiency, code quality, and timely delivery.
• Contribute to software architecture discussions, translate system-level designs and architectural blueprints into robust, maintainable, and high-quality code, applying the latest best practices in software engineering.

Required Skills/Experience:

• 6+ years in roles directly responsible for the availability, performance, and security of critical databases.
• Expertise in Database Technologies: Strong command of MySQL, PostgreSQL, AWS Aurora, SQL Server and experience with MongoDB, DynamoDB, or Redis, including schema design and complex query writing.
• Database Performance & Scalability: Proven ability in query optimization (e.g., EXPLAIN plans), operating system optimization, advanced indexing strategies, and implementing partitioning/sharding and caching (Redis).
• Cloud Database Operations: Hands-on experience deploying, managing, and optimizing databases within AWS infrastructure (RDS, Aurora) and virtual machine infrastructure (SQL Server).
• Database Reliability & Security: Experience with high availability (replication, failover), backup automation, PITR, and data security (encryption, SQL injection prevention).
• Automation & DevOps: Proficiency in integrating database changes into CI/CD pipelines using schema migration tools (DbUp, EF migrations, Flyway, Liquibase) and Git for version control.
• Scripting & Troubleshooting: Strong scripting skills (Python/Bash) for automation and ability to analyze logs and monitor performance using tools like AWS Cloudwatch, Datadog, Prometheus, Grafana, or pgBadger.
• Solid understanding of DevOps practices, including CI/CD pipelines (e.g., GitLab CI, Cloudbees, Jenkins, GitHub Actions), containerization with Docker, and monitoring/logging tools.
• Demonstrated experience in leading software development teams, fostering a collaborative and high-performance culture, and effectively representing the team’s technical vision and needs to stakeholders, including architects and senior management.
• Strong capability in identifying technical challenges and bottlenecks, constructively proposing and implementing effective solutions (either individually or by guiding the team), while actively building team engagement, fostering a positive atmosphere, and championing team spirit.
• Master of Science Degree in software engineering or a related field.
• Proficiency in English spoken and written.

Nice-to-Haves:

• Experience with ETL/ELT pipeline design and tools (e.g., Apache Airflow).
• Familiarity with Change Data Capture (CDC) solutions.
• Knowledge of database services on other cloud platforms (e.g., Azure SQL Database, Google Cloud Spanner).
• Understanding of ORM frameworks (Entity Framework, Dapper, SQLAlchemy, Hibernate) from a database performance perspective.
• Experience with data governance or data lineage concepts and tools.
• Active contributions to open-source database projects or the broader database community.
• Proficiency in designing and implementing GraphQL backends or similar API patterns that interact heavily with databases.
• Understanding of airline operations, flight planning, or air navigation principles.
• Passion for the aviation industry.

We offer:

• Stable employment based on a full-time job contract.
• International working environment in a dynamic company.
• Access to the latest knowledge and technologies enabling professional development.
• Training and development possibilities.
• Participating in international projects and international trips.
• Competitive salary dependent on experience and qualifications.
• Flexible working hours and work-from-home opportunities.
• Private medical coverage for you and your family.
• Sport card.
• Life insurance for you and your family.
• Co-funding for meals.
• Employee stock ownership plan.

Applications: We thank all applicants for applying. Only selected applicants will be contacted. Navblue is committed to creating an environment and a culture where everyone feels like they belong no matter who they are or where they are from. We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all individuals based on job-related qualifications and ability to perform a job. We do not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, colour, sex, age, national or ethnic origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, family status, genetic characteristics, record of offences, and basis of disability or any protected class. Accommodations will be available on request for candidates throughout the entire recruitment and selection process.