Principal Software Engineer- Search Engineer
About the team:
The Search and AI Platform is Elsevier’s agentic data platform, which powers products such as Scopus, ScienceDirect, and our next-generation LLM-powered research systems.
The platform uses agentic services to interrogate our rich knowledge graphs, search and recommendation systems, and our unparalleled collection of research data to deliver insights to the scientific community so they can collaborate more effectively, work smarter, and deliver quality research more quickly.
We are looking for an experienced and forward-thinking Principal Software Engineer to provide technical leadership in the design, evolution, and operation of our search infrastructure, with a strong focus on Elasticsearch, lexical and semantic search, and scalable distributed systems
About the role:
The Search Platform Team is a core part of Elsevier’s Search and AI Platform, responsible for Elasticsearch cluster operations, index design, ranking, and content freshness across products such as Scopus and ScienceDirect, as well as next-generation AI-powered and LLM-augmented search systems.
The team also owns the retrieval layer, which is currently REST-based and is evolving toward a GraphQL-based API.
As a Principal Software Engineer, you will act as a technical authority and multiplier across teams, shaping search architecture, defining best practices, and ensuring our Elasticsearch-based platform is scalable, performant, and future-proof. You will work closely with product, data science, AI, and downstream consumer teams to enable high-quality lexical, vector, and hybrid search experiences.
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Key responsibilities:
Provide technical leadership and architectural direction for large-scale search systems built on Elasticsearch
Drive performance optimization and scalability across search indices, queries, and retrieval services
Ensure search systems meet security, compliance, and data governance requirements appropriate for a global research platform.
Oversee deployment and scaling strategies on Kubernetes (EKS), ensuring resilience, observability, and high availability.
Champion clean code, SOLID principles, and engineering best practices, setting standards and mentoring engineers.
Collaborate with product managers, data scientists, and other engineering teams to deliver advanced search and recommendation features.
Ensure robust monitoring and logging with New Relic and ELK, driving reliability and performance.
Requirements:
Proven experience as a Software Engineering Lead / Tech Lead / Principal working on search platforms or large-scale distributed systems.
Strong expertise in Java and the Spring Boot ecosystem.
Deep hands-on expertise with Elasticsearch, including index design, relevance tuning, and performance optimization.
An advocate of best practices for rapid development of quality software, including clean code, architectural design patterns, CI/CD
Solid background in cloud-native architectures with AWS and Kubernetes (EKS).
Comfortable learning new technologies, languages, and tools on the job, to ensure that the product is not left behind in a rapidly evolving ecosystem
Excellent communication and leadership skills, with a track record of mentoring and guiding teams.
An inclusive, positive, collaborative mindset and a desire to deliver real business value to our customers
Nice to have -
Experience migrating APIs from REST to GraphQL at scale.
Knowledge of cost optimization for large Elasticsearch clusters.
Experience using Python for search tooling, data analysis, or supporting services.
Experience with semantic or vector-based search systems, including embeddings and hybrid lexical–semantic retrieval approaches
Familiarity with search platforms or AI-driven discovery systems.
Why join us?
Join our team and contribute to a culture of innovation, collaboration, and excellence. If you are ready to advance your career and make a significant impact, we encourage you to apply.
Work in a way that works for you
We promote a healthy work/life balance across the organization. We offer an appealing working prospect for our people. With numerous wellbeing initiatives, shared parental leave, study assistance, and sabbaticals, we will help you meet your immediate responsibilities and your long-term goals.
Working flexible hours - flexing the times when you work in the day to help you fit everything in and work when you are the most productive.
Working for you
We know that your well-being and happiness are key to a long and successful career. These are some of the benefits we are delighted to offer:
Comprehensive Pension Plan
Home, office, or commuting allowance.
Generous vacation entitlement and option for sabbatical leave
Maternity, Paternity, Adoption, and Family Care leave
Flexible working hours
Personal Choice budget
Internal communities and networks
Various employee discounts
Recruitment introduction reward
Employee Assistance Program (global)
About the business –
A global leader in information and analytics, we help researchers and healthcare professionals advance science and improve health outcomes for the benefit of society. Building on our publishing heritage, we combine quality information and vast data sets with analytics to support visionary science and research, health education, and interactive learning, as well as exceptional healthcare and clinical practice. At Elsevier, your work contributes to the world’s grand challenges and a more sustainable future. We harness innovative technologies to support science and healthcare to partner for a better world.
We know your well-being and happiness are key to a long and successful career. We are delighted to offer country specific benefits. Click here to access benefits specific to your location.
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