Remote Backend Developer (Java/Kotlin) - Romania — Columbus
Traveler-Friendly Insight
This is a fully remote contract role, but with a firm geographic restriction: candidates must be based in Romania. This significantly limits location flexibility for nomads — you'll need to maintain Romanian residency or tax presence, and the role is not open to applicants working from other countries.
That said, within Romania, this is entirely location-independent. Popular Romanian digital nomad hubs like Cluj-Napoca, Bucharest, and Brașov offer fast internet, affordable coworking spaces (€5–15/day), and a cost of living well below Western European norms — making a contract developer rate stretch considerably further than in London or Amsterdam.
Timezone considerations: Romania operates on EET/EEST (UTC+2/+3). The job description does not specify required hours, and the international, cross-functional team structure suggests some async flexibility — though overlapping with UK/EU business hours is likely expected for collaboration.
- Visa note: As an EU member state, Romania is accessible to EU/EEA citizens without visa requirements. Non-EU nationals should verify Romanian freelance/contractor registration requirements.
- No equipment stipend or coworking allowance is mentioned — factor this into your contract rate negotiation.
If you're a nomad looking for full location freedom across multiple countries, this role won't fit. It's best suited to Romania-based contractors who want remote flexibility within that country.
About Us
At Masabi, we're driving the fare payment revolution, powering the journeys of millions all over the world. We build fare collection platforms that allow riders to seamlessly buy and present tickets for public transport either on their mobile phones, from a ticket machine, or even by tapping their bank card to travel.
Our Justride platform is used in over 250 locations globally, including some of the largest cities in the world. With our industry-first mobile ticketing SDK, we've partnered with large players in the transport space, including Uber, Moovit and Transit.
Your own journey is important to us too. Choosing a role here means joining a network of innovators from all walks of life; a group of passionate individuals who consistently deliver. Here, you'll find the tools you need to build the career you want. Whether you're taking the direct route or trying a new path, we'll support you no matter what.
The Role
At Masabi, we're powering the journeys of millions by making public transport payments simple, accessible, and seamless.
We're looking for Backend Developers to help build and evolve the services at the heart of our Justride platform. You'll work on cloud-native, event-driven systems that run at scale for transit agencies around the world — from fare and ticketing logic to the APIs and integrations that connect riders, operators and partners.
As part of a cross-functional team, you'll work closely with engineers, testers and product partners to take features from idea to production. What you build will shape the experience of riders every day.
Location
This is a fully remote contract role for people based in Romania.
Responsibilities
- Build and maintain backend services and APIs that power core parts of the Justride platform
- Contribute to the design of scalable, secure and resilient distributed systems
- Collaborate with cross-functional teams to deliver features from concept through to production
- Write clean, well-tested, maintainable code and contribute to code reviews and shared engineering standards
- Build and support integrations with internal services and third-party systems
- Monitor and improve the performance, reliability and observability of the services you own
- Contribute to technical discussions and help shape solutions and best practices
- Take ownership of your work and support team outcomes
About You
- Clear, confident communication in written and spoken English
- Solid commercial experience building backend systems in Java or Kotlin
- Understanding of distributed systems and how to build for scale and reliability
- Comfortable designing and working with REST APIs and service-based or event-driven architectures
- Hands-on experience with cloud platforms, ideally AWS
- A thoughtful approach to code quality, testing and maintainability
- Collaborative and team-oriented, happy to share knowledge and learn from others
- Strong problem-solving skills and a proactive mindset
- Able to explain technical ideas clearly to both technical and non-technical colleagues
We don't expect you to tick every box. What matters most is curiosity, a willingness to learn, and the motivation to take ownership of your work.
What You'll Learn
- How a global fare payment platform works at scale, used by transit agencies and millions of riders
- Hands-on experience with event-driven architecture, Kafka, AWS and infrastructure as code
- How to deliver in a cross-functional, international team where developers help shape the technical direction
Our Stack
- Java / Kotlin (nice to have)
- Event-driven architecture, RESTful APIs
- AWS (DynamoDB, S3, SQS, EC2, ECS etc.)
- Kafka
- Terraform
- Grafana
- Gradle, Maven, Git
Why Join Masabi?
- Driven by Purpose – We believe in journeys made simple. The work isn't always easy, but the best things never are.
- Encouraged to Accelerate – Masabi is going places and our people are in the driving seat. Whether you're taking the direct route or exploring new paths, we support your journey.
- Advancing with Empathy – We put people first and foster a culture of learning, not blame. No matter your cargo, we share the load.
We are a network of innovators from all walks of life, passionate about making a difference. At Masabi, we operate with openness and trust, creating an environment where everyone feels empowered to bring their whole, authentic selves to work.
Whoever you are, just be yourself.
We welcome applications from underrepresented groups, including disabled and neurodivergent people, and can make adjustments at any stage of the process. You're also welcome to share your pronouns whenever you feel comfortable. Together, we simplify journeys, remove barriers, and improve daily life for millions.
We're already powering journeys — are you ready to join us?
Frequently Asked Questions
Is this role open to candidates outside Romania?
What programming languages are required for this position?
Is this a permanent position or a contract?
What cloud platform experience is needed?
Do I need to have experience with all technologies in the stack?
