Lead Data Engineer & Architect (Snowflake & GCP)

We are looking for Lead Data Engineer & Architect (Snowflake & GCP) to join our team. Join us as a Lead Data Engineer & Architect (Snowflake & GCP) and help power our next-generation regional data platform for credit risk analytics, device financing, and real-time operations, transforming the way financial services are delivered to thousands of end users and merchant partners across 8 countries. We are a fast-growing multinational Fintech leader transforming financial inclusion and consumer credit across 8 countries in Latin America (including Mexico, Colombia, Panama, and Central America). We build innovative financing solutions—combining credit lines, proprietary device-financing technology, and advanced analytics—to empower our regional ecosystem. We seek a mature, highly experienced Lead Data Engineer & Architect with 5+ years of technical expertise who thrives in complex, multi-country cloud environments—balancing deep data engineering execution with multi-region architectural governance, security, and FinOps strategic leadership. Your primary strength will be designing, building, and optimizing production environment architectures in Snowflake, alongside GCP core ingestion services (Cloud SQL, Datastream CDC, Cloud Storage). Deep experience in semantic layer delivery using dbt and infrastructure-as-code via Snowflake Database Change Management (DCM) Projects integrated with GitHub is required. As a technical leader, you will engage across Product, Risk, Engineering, BI, and Regional Leadership, forging strong relationships to deliver real business value. Here, thoughtful communication and constructive negotiation are as critical as engineering prowess. Responsibilities: Architecture & Modernization: Lead the architecture, end-to-end development, and continuous improvement of our multi-country data platform across 8 LATAM operations, advocating for modern, scalable, and secure solutions primarily in Snowflake and Google Cloud Platform (GCP). Pipeline & Ingestion Engineering: Build and maintain scalable ingestion and streaming pipelines connecting GCP Cloud SQL via Datastream (CDC) into GCP Cloud Storage (Bronze Layer) and onward into Snowflake using Snowpipe, Streams, and Tasks. Semantic Layer & Data Modeling: Implement and standardize the core data model (Star Schema, Medallion Architecture) using dbt to create an explicit, reliable semantic layer for cross-country analytics and BI consumption. Data Operations & CI/CD: Establish modern DataOps practices by managing database objects, deployments, and versions via Snowflake DCM Projects directly integrated with GitHub CI/CD pipelines. Governance & Security Architecture: Define and enforce multi-country data governance, granular RBAC (Role-Based Access Control), dynamic data masking, row-level security, and strict compliance with local PII / personal data protection laws across all 8 jurisdictions. FinOps & Performance Optimization: Actively manage cloud economics by optimizing virtual warehouse sizing, clustering keys, query execution, caching, auto-suspend rules, and resource monitors to keep Snowflake credit consumption predictable and efficient. Stakeholder Alignment: Act as a bridge between technical and non-technical stakeholders, translating business goals into robust data pipelines while keeping query execution fast and reliable for Product, Risk, and Executive teams. Mentorship & Quality Culture: Mentor and inspire data engineers, introducing software engineering best practices (testing, code reviews, automated CI/CD) into data workflows and fostering a transparent, feedback-rich engineering environment. Requirements: Education: Bachelor's degree or higher in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Data Engineering, or a related quantitative field. Snowflake Expertise: 3+ years of hands-on production experience in Snowflake (or 5+ years in cloud data warehousing with 3+ dedicated to Snowflake). Master-level knowledge of virtual warehouses, micro-partitioning, Streams & Tasks, Snowpipe, Time Travel, Zero-Copy Cloning, and Snowpark. Mandatory GCP Cloud Experience: Proven, practical experience working with Google Cloud Platform (GCP), specifically GCP Cloud Storage, Cloud SQL, and Datastream (CDC) for raw data ingestion. Semantic Modeling & Software Engineering Tools: Strong expertise in dbt (dbt Core or Cloud) for transformational workflows and Snowflake DCM Projects / Git for version control and data-as-code infrastructure deployments. Advanced Code & Scripting: Expert proficiency in Advanced SQL and strong proficiency in Python for automated scripting, data processing, and custom integrations. Data Security & Governance: Concrete experience designing multi-tenant or multi-country security architectures including dynamic PII masking, RBAC policies, and regulatory compliance. Stakeholder & Leadership Skills: Outstanding technical communication and negotiation skills. Ability to explain architectural trade-offs to non-technical business leaders in Spanish and produce technical documentation in English. Language Proficiency: Professional fluency in Spanish (operational requirement across LATAM teams) and strong written/spoken English (for global vendor/engineering standards). Nice to Haves SnowPro Core or SnowPro Advanced Architect certification. Prior experience in the Fintech, Banking, or Consumer Credit sector dealing with LATAM regulatory environments. Direct experience integrating downstream BI platforms (Power BI, Looker, Tableau) with Snowflake semantic layers. We offer*: Flexible working format - remote, office-based or flexible A competitive salary and good compensation package Personalized career growth Professional development tools (mentorship program, tech talks and trainings, centers of excellence, and more) Active tech communities with regular knowledge sharing Education reimbursement Memorable anniversary presents Corporate events and team buildings Other location-specific benefits *not applicable for freelancers