Technical Lead, SaaS Core Platform

About the Role

Location: Hanoi or Da Nang office. If you are based in Ho Chi Minh City, 2-3 weeks per month in Da Nang or Hanoi office (Open for discussion)

Our Vietnam team is the engine of Everfit. Currently around 170 people, roughly 150 in Da Nang and 20 in Hanoi, who built the product that’s made us a category leader in 5 years since launch .

The next chapter is about unlocking what this team is capable of — moving faster but with extreme precision, building with AI in every workflow, and operating at the level of the best companies in the world.

We are looking for a Tech Lead to anchor the technical direction of Everfit's Core squad — the most used, most business-critical part of our platform.

What makes this role unique is breadth. Core's teams span backend, frontend, mobile, and DevOps — and you'll need to provide meaningful technical oversight across all of them. You don't need to be an expert in every discipline, but you should be fluent enough to guide architecture decisions, challenge technical trade-offs, and earn the trust of engineers regardless of their stack. Your primary depth is backend — that's where the hardest system design problems live. But your awareness of how mobile, frontend, and DevOps connect to the backend is what makes you effective as the technical anchor for Core.

You will drive technical excellence, lead the adoption of AI across engineering workflows and products, mentor and grow our developers, and help build a high-performance engineering culture. Working closely with product, design, and leadership teams across Vietnam and the US, you will align technical execution with business goals and ensure the team delivers impactful solutions with speed, quality, and scalability.

Responsibilities

Technical Direction & Architecture

• Own the architectural patterns and technical standards for Core's backend systems — workout programming engines, scheduling logic, nutrition tracking, multi-tenant platform infrastructure, notification pipelines, and third-party integrations.
• Drive solution design for complex features: new product areas, cross-squad integrations, platform-level changes, and performance-critical systems.
• Make architectural decisions that balance delivery velocity with long-term maintainability — Core is a high-frequency product and tech debt accumulates fast.
• Define and uphold engineering standards across all six Core sub-squads: API design, data modeling, testing practices, code review culture, and documentation.
• Proactively identify and lead reduction of technical debt in coordination with Engineering Management and Product.

Hands-on Engineering

• Stay in the code on the most critical work — core platform infrastructure, high-risk migrations, cross-squad technical foundations, and architectural proof-of-concepts.
• Review pull requests across sub-squads with depth and speed, giving feedback that helps engineers grow — not just ships.
• Set the standard for what good code looks like across Core: observable, testable, maintainable, and scalable.

AI-First Engineering

• Champion AI-assisted development across all Core sub-squads — from code generation and test writing to automated documentation and PR reviews.
• Collaborate with the AI squad on integrating AI features directly into Core workflows: smart programming suggestions, automated progress summaries, AI-powered onboarding.
• Help engineers build practical AI fluency through pairing, demos, and shared tooling workflows.

Mentorship & Team Growth

• Mentor and coach engineers across Core sub-squads — raising the technical bar through code reviews, architectural guidance, and technical pairing.
• Run regular technical discussions and design reviews that help engineers grow as system thinkers, not just feature builders.
• Contribute to hiring across Core: design technical assessments and conduct engineering interviews calibrated to the Core domain.

Cross-functional Collaboration

• Be the primary technical voice in product discovery across Core — shaping what's feasible, what's scalable, and what will cause pain six months from now.
• Partner closely with Core PMs, BAs, QA Lead, and Design to ensure technical decisions translate cleanly into user-facing product quality.
• Align with Tech Leads in other squads (Marketplace, Payment, AI) on shared infrastructure, platform standards, and cross-squad integrations.
• Represent Core Engineering in cross-functional leadership discussions, communicating system decisions with clarity to non-technical stakeholders.

Requirements

Ideal Candidate Background

• US/UK education or international experience is highly preferred. We value leaders who bring a global perspective, have been exposed to high-performing organizations, and can combine international best practices with a deep understanding of Vietnam's talent and culture. This unique blend of experience will help us continue building a world-class company and team.
• You have a real engineering and product background. You understand how software gets built and you can earn the respect of builders

Must-Have

• 5+ years of backend engineering experience, with 2+ years in a Tech Lead or equivalent role. Former startup founders, or engineers from highly entrepreneurial environments.
• Deep backend fundamentals: distributed systems, data modeling, event-driven architectures, API design, scalability, and reliability.
• Hands-on experience in at least two of the four initiative domains: payments/fintech, marketplace/platform, B2B SaaS, or AI/LLM engineering.
• A track record of designing maintainable systems and raising the technical bar across teams.
• Strong English communication skills and an AI-first engineering mindset.

Preferred Skills

• Familiarity with: Node.js, MongoDB, PostgreSQL, AWS, Docker, or equivalent.
• Experience in high-growth startups or distributed teams across time zones (Vietnam and US).

Benefits