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OPEN POSITION · CONFIDENTIAL PROJECT

Lead Data & Platform Engineer

Spanish Health Data company

A technical leadership role with genuine ownership of the architecture, evolution and operation of a critical clinical data platform.

MadridHybrid workingPermanent contractImmediate start
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01

The project

Our client is a Spanish company specialising in health consulting, research and innovation. Its platform integrates clinical and Real World Evidence data for research and healthcare decision-making, under demanding security, traceability and availability requirements.

We are looking for the person who will take technical ownership of the platform: architecture, data model, source integration, continuous ingestion, quality, performance and operations. This is not a maintenance role; the successful candidate will make the architectural decisions, document them and lead the platform’s evolution in production.

02

Key responsibilities

  • Consolidate and scale the clinical platform to support new sources, larger data volumes and more concurrent projects.
  • Design the continuous ingestion and event-driven processing architecture, including topics, partitioning, idempotency, retention, replication and recovery.
  • Integrate clinical, hospital and administrative sources, resolving heterogeneous formats, terminologies and identifiers.
  • Redesign and optimise the relational model on PostgreSQL: tuning, partitioning, indexes, RLS and replication.
  • Design the healthcare interoperability layer using HL7 FHIR R4 and verifiable data contracts.
  • Set engineering standards, document architectural decisions and contribute to hiring and developing the team.
03

Technology environment

  • Apache Kafka / Confluent Platform, Kafka Connect and Schema Registry.
  • Change Data Capture with Debezium and distributed stream processing with Kafka Streams, Apache Flink or ksqlDB.
  • Advanced PostgreSQL and Python for data processing, integration and automation.
  • Kubernetes, Docker, CI/CD and on-premise and hybrid-cloud deployments.
  • Airflow, Prefect or Dagster; dbt or equivalent tools for version-controlled transformations.
  • HL7 FHIR R4, HL7v2, CDA and terminologies including SNOMED-CT, ICD-10, ATC and LOINC.
04

Required profile

  • University degree in Computer Engineering, Telecommunications Engineering, Mathematics or a related field.
  • A master’s degree or postgraduate studies in Big Data, Databases or Artificial Intelligence will be valued.
  • At least 10 years’ experience in data engineering or data platform architecture, including 3–5 years as a technical lead or architect.
  • Experience leading the end-to-end construction or modernisation of a critical data platform, with responsibility for architecture, implementation and operations.
  • Hands-on production experience with Kafka / Confluent, advanced PostgreSQL, Python and Kubernetes.
  • Experience in regulated environments or domains with demanding security, traceability and data-sovereignty requirements.
  • Ability to lead technical teams while remaining hands-on.
  • Professional English at C1 level or above.
05

Highly valued

  • Experience with real clinical data, EHRs, registries or hospital data.
  • OMOP CDM or other healthcare common data models.
  • Experience with on-premise AI platforms, LLMs, RAG or NLP applied to clinical text.
  • Knowledge of GDPR applied to health data and public-sector security frameworks.
  • Official Confluent or cloud-platform certifications.
06

What the project offers

  • Genuine technical ownership and autonomy to decide, document and defend the architecture.
  • Direct impact on research projects, treatments and healthcare decision-making.
  • Complex challenges across interoperability, continuous ingestion, security and data sovereignty.
  • An active role in growing the unit and the technical team.
  • Training and certification budget for the technology stack.
  • Compensation aligned with a senior technical leadership profile and the experience offered.
07

How to apply

Email your CV to Antonio Morales and attach a short technical description —no more than one page— of a critical data platform you have led, covering the context, your architectural decisions, production operations and the outcome.

The email will open with the subject line ‘Application — Lead Data & Platform Engineer’ already completed.