Lead AQA (Java) Engineer

Our Client is a global technology company serving large enterprises with mission-critical SaaS products in the brand protection and domain management space. The Client is consolidating multiple client portals into a single modern platform on AWS, with migration of existing clients onto it. The work spans application development, cloud infrastructure, and platform reliability as the new system scales.

The Client currently has minimal test automation in place, making this a greenfield opportunity to define and build the automation framework from the ground up — covering regression, API, and end-to-end testing across the platform. As the QA lead, this role owns the overall test strategy and helps grow the team's QA capacity and automation culture.

Requirements:

• 8+ years of commercial QA automation experience on web-based products, including a lead or ownership role
• Proven track record defining and building test automation frameworks from the ground up
• Strong experience with end-to-end UI automation (Playwright (preferred) or Selenium)
• Hands-on experience with API test automation
• Working knowledge of PHPUnit and/or Pest for feature and integration testing in Laravel applications
• Comfort working with at least one of Java or TypeScript / JavaScript as the primary automation language
• Solid understanding of test design principles — page object model, data-driven testing, test isolation, flake prevention
• Experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, or AWS CodePipeline)
• Familiarity with MySQL / Postgres for test data setup, validation, and cleanup
• Strong debugging and root-cause analysis skills across frontend, backend, and API layers
• Ability to define quality standards, set best practices, and mentor both QA engineers and developers
• Ability to work embedded within a client's team and shape strategy in collaboration with their engineers
• Ability to work with significant overlap with US Mountain Time, especially during ramp-up — distributed team across US / UK / Brazil
• Excellent English communication skills
• Experience working in Agile / Scrum / Kanban

Nice to Have:

• Experience with performance and load testing tools (k6, JMeter, Gatling)
• Exposure to contract testing (Pact) or BDD frameworks (Cucumber, Behat)
• Background in SaaS, multi-tenant platforms, or large-scale B2B portals
• Experience with AI-assisted testing tools (Copilot, Claude, Cursor) for test generation and maintenance
• Knowledge of RabbitMQ or other message brokers for event-driven test scenarios
• AWS services exposure (S3, CloudWatch, SQS)

Responsibilities:

• Own the automation framework architecture — tooling selection, patterns, reporting, and CI integration
• Define and drive the overall test strategy across UI (Playwright), API, and backend (PHPUnit / Pest) layers
• Design, build, and maintain automated test suites with clear coverage of regression, smoke, and critical user journeys
• Partner with PHP and Java developers to embed testing into the development workflow — test-first mindset, PR-level test gates, shift-left practices
• Integrate test execution into CI/CD pipelines, ensuring fast feedback on every commit
• Define and track quality metrics — coverage, pass rate, flake rate, regression cycle time
• Mentor QA engineers and developers; build and grow a test automation culture across the teams
• Help scale QA capacity, prioritizing where automation delivers the most value early
• Troubleshoot failing tests and environment issues, working with DevOps and engineering to resolve root causes
• Collaborate with the Client on test strategy and release readiness
• Participate in Agile ceremonies (stand-ups, planning, retros, demos)