Relocate to Dubai Chief Technology Officer (French speaking/FinTech/Payments)

Our client is a Dubai-based technology company operating in the fintech sector, with an active footprint in Africa through its mobile money and payments operations in Guinea. The organisation is focused on delivering innovative digital financial solutions that enhance accessibility, efficiency, and financial inclusion across emerging markets. Role Overview The CTO owns the company’s technology vision, architecture, security posture, and execution standards. This role ensures reliable delivery, scalable operations, and regulatory readiness across a high transaction fintech platform and a B2B ordering platform. The CTO builds and leads a strong internal engineering organization, governs external technology partners, and ensures all technology decisions directly support business growth, compliance expectations, and long-term platform maintainability. Job Type: Full Time/Permanent Reports to: Chief Executive Officer Platforms: High-transaction fintech/payments platform and B2B ordering/trade platform Geographic Context: Multi-country, emerging markets (Africa exposure preferred) Requirements 10–15+ years of software engineering experience, including 5+ years leading teams in high transaction, integration-heavy platforms (fintech/payments strongly preferred). Strong architecture and backend depth in enterprise-grade systems (JVM-class ecosystems or equivalent). Deep understanding of API-first design and relational database fundamentals. Practical knowledge of modern authentication/authorization patterns and secure engineering practices in regulated environments. Strong delivery governance experience (agile at scale, release management, QA discipline, operational readiness). Proven experience leading external tech partners and vendors with measurable SLAs and accountability. Working knowledge of cloud platforms, CI/CD pipelines, observability, and production operations (hands-on experience is a plus). Excellent communication skills in English and French . Experience operating in Africa or similar emerging markets is highly preferred. Leadership Expectations High ownership: Drives outcomes, not excuses. Strong judgment: Makes pragmatic decisions and manages trade-offs transparently. Calm under pressure: Leads incidents and high-stakes decisions with clarity and confidence Responsibilities Technology Strategy & Vision Define and communicate a clear multi-year technology strategy aligned with business priorities (growth, reliability, compliance, cost discipline). Establish architectural principles and engineering standards that balance delivery speed with scalability and long-term maintainability. Own technology roadmap inputs, including: Platform evolution and scalability planning Security and compliance maturity roadmap Data and analytics capability development Delivery Governance & Execution Excellence Establish and enforce a disciplined delivery operating system: sprint cadence, release governance, QA gates, documentation standards, and launch readiness. Ensure consistent, predictable delivery through strong prioritization, dependency management, and proactive risk mitigation. Drive cross-functional execution alignment across Product, Operations, Commercial, Compliance, and Support teams. Vendor and Technology Partner Leadership Lead technology partner selection and provide input into contracting, commercials, and SLAs. Implement and manage vendor scorecards covering delivery quality, speed, stability, responsiveness, and SLA adherence. Enforce accountability through structured escalation, corrective action plans, and performance reviews. Govern third-party integrations end-to-end, including API contracts, rollout plans, monitoring, and settlement readiness where applicable. Architecture, Security, and Regulatory Readiness Ensure secure-by-design engineering practices across platforms, including: o Identity and access management patterns Audit trails and logging Data protection and secure coding fundamentals Vulnerability management and remediation Own technical readiness for compliance-driven requirements (e.g., KYC/AML workflows, traceability, operational controls) in partnership with Compliance and Legal. Define and maintain policies for incident response, disaster recovery, and business continuity. Reliability, Performance, and Production Operations Own production stability and performance across platforms. Define and enforce standards for monitoring, alerting, incident management, and post-incident root cause analysis. Ensure capacity planning and performance tuning appropriate for high-transaction environments. Build operational runbooks and ensure support teams can resolve day-to-day issues without engineering becoming a bottleneck. Team Building, Leadership, and Culture Recruit, develop, and retain high-performing technical talent. Build leadership layers including engineering managers, technical leads, and platform owners. Create a culture of accountability, measurable outcomes, documentation, and quality. Coach leaders on delivery management, performance management, and professional stakeholder communication. Budgeting & Technology Financial Discipline Own technology budgets, including infrastructure costs, vendor spend, and build-vs-buy decisions. Maintain strong cost governance without compromising reliability, security, or compliance. Provide transparent reporting to CEO and Board on: Technology spend Delivery health Key risks and technical debt Success Metrics (12–18 Months) Delivery & Execution Roadmap milestone hit rate and release predictability. Reduction in slipped or de-scoped releases. Platform Stability & Reliability Uptime and availability against targets. Incident frequency, MTTR, and repeat incident rate. Quality Production defect rate and defect leakage. Regression frequency and overall quality maturity. Security & Compliance Audit outcomes and regulatory findings. Time to close critical vulnerabilities. Security incident frequency and severity. Vendor Performance SLA adherence. Delivery quality scores. Escalation resolution time. Team & Leadership Hiring plan achievement. Attrition control. Strength and depth of leadership bench. Benefits Visa sponsorship Flights covered Spouse and children sponsorship included Health insurance included Additional benefits are company specific and open to discussion