Product Engineer

Product Engineer | £530-£700 per day | Contract to PermanentLocation: Belfast, Northern Ireland
Contract: Initial 6 months, moving to permanent
Contract Rate: £530-£700 per day, depending on experience
Permanent Salary: £85,000-£120,000
Working Pattern: Hybrid, 3 days per week in the Belfast office
Sponsorship: Not available Please note: Candidates must currently be based in Northern Ireland.
The OpportunityWe are recruiting Product Engineers to join a major global technology environment in Belfast, working within autonomous product teams to design, build and deliver high-impact software. These opportunities will initially be offered as six-month contracts at £530-£700 per day, with the intention of moving into permanent positions paying £85,000-£120,000, depending on experience and level.This is not a traditional software development role focused solely on delivering tickets. We are looking for engineers who enjoy product thinking, design, building, prototyping and delivering solutions end-to-end, while using modern AI-assisted engineering tools to accelerate development.The role is highly hands-on, spanning coding, architecture, technical problem-solving and product delivery.
What You'll Be Doing

• Design, build and ship software from initial concept through to production
• Develop modern full-stack applications across frontend, backend, APIs and cloud
• Work closely with product stakeholders to understand user journeys and determine the right technical solution
• Rapidly prototype and test ideas before committing to full-scale development
• Build scalable, maintainable architectures and API solutions
• Use AI-assisted development tools, including GitHub Copilot and similar coding agents, to accelerate delivery
• Review, test and validate both engineer-written and AI-generated code
• Contribute to engineering standards, automated testing, CI/CD and modern development practices

What We're Looking ForWe're interested in Product Engineers and Software Engineers with strong hands-on development skills. The original specification is open to candidates with approximately 2 to 8+ years' professional software engineering experience, with level determined by technical depth and scope of ownership.
You'll ideally bring experience across some of the following:

• React.js, TypeScript or JavaScript
• Python or comparable modern backend technologies
• RESTful or GraphQL API development
• PostgreSQL and database design
• Cloud-native development, ideally AWS
• AWS Lambda, S3, CloudFront, API Gateway and RDS
• Terraform / Infrastructure as Code
• Git/GitHub and CI/CD
• Automated testing
• AI-assisted development tools such as GitHub Copilot, Claude Code or Devin AI Just as importantly, we're looking for engineers who can think beyond the code. You should be curious, comfortable challenging assumptions and able to take genuine ownership of what you build and the outcome it delivers.

Why Consider This Opportunity?This is an opportunity to work in a modern product engineering environment where you'll have the autonomy to design, build, test and deliver, rather than simply working through development tickets.You'll work with modern cloud and AI-assisted development technologies while contributing directly to the direction and delivery of products used within a large-scale global organisation.
Important Information Before ApplyingYou must currently be based in Northern Ireland and able to work from the Belfast office three days per week. Sponsorship is not available for these positions.The roles will initially be offered on a six-month contract basis at £530-£700 per day, before moving to permanent positions with salaries ranging from £85,000 to £120,000, depending on experience and level.If you're a hands-on engineer who enjoys building products, solving problems and taking ideas from design through to delivery, I'd be keen to hear from you.
Apply today or contact Juliann Deegan at Hays Technology for a confidential discussion.

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