Want to professionalize your AI skills, pivot to an AI role and increase your salary?
Master AI Engineering with the most practical and comprehensive LLM Development certifications at Towards AI Academy.

Visa

Lead Software Engineer

Visa

Published 07 Apr 2026
USA
192K - 308K USD Annual
Full Time

Share this job

Role Highlights

Languages used

Key skills

Integrations
CICD
Product Development
Distributed Systems
Web Services
Technical Leadership
API Design
Infrastructure
Security
Reliability
SRE
Architecture
B2B
Authentication
Cloud
Devops
Deployment
Automation
AI
QA
Agile
Scrum
MBA
PhD

Tools, Libraries and Frameworks

Rest
Core Java
J2EE
Docker
Kubernetes
AWS
Azure
GCP
Unix
Linux

Description

Visa Lead Software Engineer \\\| SmartRecruiters Google Chrome Microsoft Edge Apple Safari Mozilla Firefox . Lead Software Engineer Full-time Job Family Group: Engineering and Technology Company Description Visa is a world leader in payments technology, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across more than 200 countries and territories, dedicated to uplifting everyone, everywhere by being the best way to pay and be paid. At Visa, you'll have the opportunity to create impact at scale tackling meaningful challenges, growing your skills and seeing your contributions impact lives around the world. Join Visa and do work that matters to you, to your community, and to the world. Progress starts with you. Job Description We are seeking a highly experienced Lead Software Engineer to join Visas Shared Services Product Development organization. This role is ideal for a senior technologist who thrives as a lead generalist, operating across infrastructure, security, scalability, and platform engineering, while building foundational services that enable Visas global product ecosystem. In this role, you will design and deliver Java/J2EE-based shared services that power multiple Visa products and platforms, influencing internal engineering standards for scalability, security, reliability, and reusability. You will collaborate across Product, Engineering, Security, SRE, and Architecture teams to build resilient, cloud-native systems that support Visas mission at global scale. The Work Itself Design, build, and evolve core shared services that support Visas product development ecosystem and reach approximately 40% of the worlds population. Lead the development of scalable, secure, and reusable Java/J2EE-based services that serve as foundational platforms for multiple product teams. Act as a lead generalist, contributing across application architecture, infrastructure, security, and scalability to ensure shared services are enterprise-grade and future-ready. Collaborate cross-functionally to create architecture and design artifacts and deliver best-in-class software solutions used across Visas technical offerings. Drive continuous improvements in product quality, platform reliability, and operational excellence across shared services. Develop robust, highly available systems serving diverse use cases, including consumer-facing products, B2B platforms, and business-to-government solutions. Leverage modern technologies to build the next generation of Payment Services, Transaction Platforms, Real-Time Payments, and Buy Now Pay Later capabilities. Contribute to team and organizational growth through mentorship, technical leadership, and continuous learning initiatives. Essential Functions Provide deep technical leadership within Shared Services Product Development, with a strong understanding of how shared platforms enable downstream product innovation. Lead discovery and design sessions with product partners to translate business requirements into scalable, secure shared-service architectures. Define and formalize best practices and standards for Java/J2EE development, API design, security, and service scalability. Lead planning, piloting, and integration of new platform capabilities, including infrastructure enhancements, security controls, and AI-enabled tooling. Design and implement cloud-native, containerized services using Docker and Kubernetes, ensuring high availability, fault tolerance, and elastic scalability. Partner closely with Security teams to implement secure API gateways, authentication and authorization mechanisms, and compliance-driven architectures. Analyze systemic patterns across defects, incidents, and performance metrics, driving long-term platform improvements. The Skills You Bring Technical Leadership: Proven experience leading complex software initiatives across distributed systems and shared service platforms. Primary Language Expertise: Strong expertise in Java (Core Java, J2EE, RESTful services). Architecture & Scalability: Experience designing highly available, scalable, and secure distributed systems. Cloud & Infrastructure: Hands-on experience with container-based architectures using Docker and Kubernetes, and cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP). Security: Strong understanding of secure API design, authentication/authorization, secure gateway patterns, and enterprise security standards. DevOps & Operations: Experience with CI/CD, deployment automation, observability, capacity planning, and production operations. AI Enablement: Familiarity with integrating AI tools and services to improve platform intelligence and developer productivity. Collaboration: Strong partnership skills working with Product, QA, DevOps, SRE, and Agile/Scrum teams. Mentorship: Experience coaching engineers on technical excellence and career development. This is a hybrid position. Expectation of days in office will be confirmed by your hiring manager. Qualifications Basic Qualifications: 10+ years of relevant work experience with a Bachelors Degree or at least 7 years of work experience with an Advanced degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD) or 4 years of work experience with a PhD, OR 13+ years of relevant work experience Preferred Qualifications: 12 or more years of work experience with a Bachelors Degree or 8-10 years of experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD) or 6+ years of work experience with a PhD You have proven ability to define needs, develop plans, coordinate resources and implement action plans. Demonstrated ability to lead multiple projects simultaneously & to resolve scheduling & other conflicts in order to meet all deadlines. Thorough understanding of Container based architecture for Cloud such as Docker or Kubernetes. Experience in cloud migration and multi cloud strategy. Experience in building and establishing elastic scalability architectural patterns for web applications. Sound understanding of Service and IT operations management, and DevOps model, good knowledge of Deployment, Capacity Planning. Strong understanding of Enterprise Integration using web services, REST Understand the Security requirements and standards, and contemporary trends in Security risks as well as technologies. Experience in security domain with secure protocol with authentication, authorization and building secure gateway. Experience with a variety of development methodologies and mature understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each. Solid experience with Agile methods is a plus. Superior verbal, written & interpersonal communication skills with both technical & non-technical audiences. Experience in coaching engineers both on technical and career development. Excellent team player, with strong collaboration skills and ability to influence cross-functional team for results. Focus on building an efficient and collaborative team environment. Experience in commercial software development on Unix/Linux environment. Experience in a technical leadership role Understanding of architecture and operations of highly available and scalable applications. You have expertise of Core Java, JEE technologies, REST and container based technologies. You have experience in consumer facing application development experience. Proven track record of responsibilities as a technical lead. Proven track record of developing and architecting Secure API gateway solution with dynamic set of security standards. You have experience architecting solutions with Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery in mind. You have amazing work ethics that will help us all work extremely well together You have the passion to understanding people and to always striving to improve our products and services. Additional Information Work Hours: Varies upon the needs of the department. Travel Requirements: This position requires travel 5-10% of the time. Mental/Physical Requirements: This position will be performed in an office setting.  The position will require the incumbent to sit and stand at a desk, communicate in person and by telephone, frequently operate standard office equipment, such as telephones and computers. Visa is an EEO Employer.  Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status.  Visa will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with EEOC guidelines and applicable local law. Visa will consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with applicable local law, including the requirements of Article 49 of the San Francisco Police Code. U.S. APPLICANTS ONLY:  The estimated salary range for this position is $192,300 to $307,600 USD per year, which may include potential sales incentive payments (if applicable).  Salary may vary depending on job-related factors which may include knowledge, skills, experience, and location. In addition, this position may be eligible for bonus and equity. Visa has a comprehensive benefits package for which this position may be eligible that includes Medical, Dental, Vision, 401 (k), FSA/HSA, Life Insurance, Paid Time Off, and Wellness Program. I'm interested I'm interestedPrivacy NoticeCookies Settings I'm interested Refer a friend Posted by Cementry Carter share this job Share on LinkedIn Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share via email Share on Xing Share on WeChat Share to WeChat × Copy the link and open WeChat to share. Copy to clipboard Open WeChat Share to WeChat × Use Scan QR Code in WeChat and click ··· to share. Lead Software Engineer Foster City, CA Full-time I'm interested I'm interested

Required Qualifications and Skills

The role requires at least 10 years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor's Degree, or at least 7 years of work experience with an Advanced Degree, or 4 years of work experience with a PhD. Preferred qualifications include 12 or more years of work experience with a Bachelor's Degree, or 8-10 years of experience with an Advanced Degree, or 6+ years of work experience with a PhD. Key skills include proven ability to define needs, develop plans, coordinate resources, and implement action plans. Demonstrated ability to lead multiple projects simultaneously and resolve conflicts to meet deadlines is essential. A thorough understanding of container-based architecture for cloud, such as Docker or Kubernetes, is required. Experience in cloud migration and multi-cloud strategy is also noted.

Disclaimer

Disclaimer: Job and company description information and some of the data fields may have been generated via GPT-4 summarisation and could contain inaccuracies. The full external job listing link should always be relied on for authoritative information.

About the company

Visa

Size

25017

Website

visa.com

HQ

Foster City, US

Public/Private

Public Company

Description

Visa is a world leader in digital payments, facilitating more than 215 billion payment transactions between various parties across over 200 countries and territories each year. Their mission is to connect the world through the most innovative, convenient, reliable, and secure payments network, enabling individuals, businesses, and economies to thrive. By including everyone everywhere, Visa believes in uplifting everyone everywhere. Working with Visa means contributing to a culture that embraces identity and purpose, ensuring that the work has a direct impact on billions of people globally by unlocking financial access and enabling the future of money movement.

Share

Share this job

Related jobs

Data Science
Data Engineer
Big Data
Project Management
USA
Full Time
Machine Learning
Data Science
Vector Database
Computer Science
USA
Full Time
Integrations
Manager
AI
Infrastructure
San Francisco, CA, USA
Full Time