FOUNDING CTO / TECHNICAL CO-FOUNDER
Digital Marketplace | Substantial Founder Equity | Remote UK
What if the next company you built was partly yours?
If you've spent years using your technical ability to build products and businesses for other people, this is an opportunity to build something you actually own.
We are looking for an exceptional senior technology professional to become the Technical Co-Founder and future CTO of an ambitious new digital marketplace being developed for North Cyprus.
This is not a conventional software-development vacancy. We are looking for a co-owner of the company.
The successful candidate will receive substantial founder equity, take ownership of the company's technology from the ground up, join the Founder/CEO in European and international investor meetings and, following successful financing, transition into the company's full-time salaried CTO while retaining their founder equity.
You won't be joining somebody else's engineering department.
You'll be helping to build the company.
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THE OPPORTUNITY
There is a significant opportunity within the North Cyprus digital marketplace sector.
North Cyprus is a rapidly developing Mediterranean destination with a substantial permanent population, thriving tourism industry, huge international student community and diverse population drawn from the UK, Turkey, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere.
The island is modern and home to luxury hotels and resorts, international universities, major residential developments, a thriving property market, car dealerships, retailers, restaurants and thousands of independent businesses.
Yet its digital marketplace infrastructure has not developed at the same pace.
Online commerce remains fragmented across social-media groups, individual websites, basic classifieds platforms and traditional offline methods. There is currently no dominant, sophisticated digital marketplace bringing these different areas of commerce together into one modern consumer ecosystem.
That disconnect is the opportunity.
Having lived in North Cyprus for five years, the founder experienced these problems firsthand and identified the opportunity for a professionally built, multi-category digital marketplace capable of consolidating fragmented areas of commerce into one major consumer platform.
The ambition is not another small local classifieds website. It is to build a serious, scalable consumer technology company capable of becoming a major digital brand in its market.
Substantial preparation has already been completed, including:
- Detailed market and competitor research
- Market feasibility analysis
- Product strategy
- Comprehensive Product Requirements Document
- Commercial and revenue modelling
- Preliminary financial forecasting
- Go-to-market strategy
- Launch and customer-acquisition planning
- Operational modelling
- Investor preparation
The market has been researched. The product has been defined. The commercial proposition and go-to-market strategy have been developed.
We are now preparing for European and international investors.
What we need now is our Technical Co-Founder.
Full product details and commercial differentiators will only be disclosed to suitable shortlisted candidates.
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ABOUT THE FOUNDER
The founder is a Londoner and British Turkish Cypriot who spent most of his life in London before relocating to North Cyprus approximately five years ago.
Living on the island exposed him firsthand to the market problems that ultimately led to this venture.
He has an extensive background in sales and commercial strategy, holds two Master's degrees, and is currently involved in the development and investment preparation of other technology ventures, including a substantial AI-driven sales technology platform.
The Founder/CEO will lead commercial strategy, fundraising, investor relationships, partnerships, go-to-market, marketing, business development, brand, operations and overall company strategy.
We are looking for the person capable of owning the other side:
Technology.
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WHO WE ARE LOOKING FOR
We are not looking for somebody who merely manages developers, somebody no longer technically hands-on, or a junior developer with an ambitious title.
We need an exceptionally capable hands-on Founding CTO / Technical Co-Founder.
Our fundamental requirement is simple:
«In theory, you should be capable of building this platform from the ground up yourself.»
That does not mean we expect one person to permanently build an entire technology company alone. The investment budget will include additional engineering hires and specialist expertise appropriate to the scale of the build.
However, additional engineers should accelerate the CTO — not compensate for gaps in the CTO's fundamental technical ability.
You must possess sufficient breadth and depth to understand, architect and, if necessary, personally build the core platform.
You must be able to build it, architect it, explain it, stress-test it and defend it, before ultimately building and leading the engineering organisation around it.
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TECHNICAL CAPABILITY
We require exceptional senior full-stack engineering capability and demonstrable experience taking substantial digital products from concept to production.
Strong experience should cover most of the following:
Frontend
- React / Next.js
- TypeScript / JavaScript
- Modern responsive web architecture
- Comparable production frameworks
Backend
- Node.js / TypeScript
- Python, Go, Java, .NET or comparable technologies
- Production-grade server architecture
There is no predetermined technology stack. Selecting and defending the appropriate architecture will be the CTO's responsibility.
Databases & Data
- PostgreSQL / MySQL or equivalent
- Relational architecture and data modelling
- Transaction integrity
- Caching and performance
- Scaling, backup and recovery
Cloud & DevOps
- AWS / Azure / Google Cloud
- CI/CD
- Containers
- Deployment architecture
- Monitoring and logging
- Security, resilience and production environments
Marketplace / E-Commerce
Experience with transactional platforms is particularly valuable, including:
- Marketplaces / e-commerce
- SaaS and consumer applications
- Multi-sided platforms
- Checkout and orders
- Seller/merchant systems
- Inventory
- Refunds and disputes
Payments
Experience with:
- Payment gateways and APIs
- Webhooks and tokenisation
- Refunds / chargebacks
- Marketplace payments
- Merchant settlement
- Fraud prevention
Real-Time Systems
- WebSockets
- Event-driven architecture
- Live transactional systems
- Messaging and notifications
- Concurrency-sensitive systems
Search & Discovery
- Marketplace search
- Filtering and indexing
- Ranking
- Geographic search
- Large listing/product catalogues
APIs & Integrations
You must be comfortable architecting sophisticated integrations with third-party commercial services and APIs.
Security
Strong understanding of:
- Authentication / authorisation
- API and infrastructure security
- Encryption and data protection
- Fraud risk and auditability
- Secure payment architecture
- Access controls
Mobile
Experience with React Native, Flutter, native iOS/Android or comparable technologies is advantageous.
You do not need to be the world's greatest specialist in every discipline. Knowing when to bring in specialist expertise is good CTO judgement.
What you cannot do is depend upon specialists to understand your own platform.
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SHOW US WHAT YOU HAVE BUILT
We are interested in evidence, not buzzwords.
Strong candidates should be able to demonstrate experience:
- Taking substantial products from 0 → production
- Architecting systems from scratch
- Building marketplaces, e-commerce, SaaS or consumer applications
- Integrating payments
- Building real-time functionality
- Designing APIs and databases
- Working with cloud infrastructure
- Owning production systems
- Solving serious engineering problems
- Leading engineers
- Making major architectural decisions
Relevant backgrounds may include Technical Founder, CTO, Founding Engineer, Staff/Principal Engineer, Lead Engineer, Head of Engineering or exceptional Senior Full-Stack Engineer.
Job titles will not determine selection. Evidence will.
Candidates should expect detailed questions about what they personally designed and built.
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INVESTOR-FACING COMMUNICATION
The Technical Co-Founder will stand alongside the Founder/CEO in European and international investor meetings.
The Founder/CEO will defend the commercial opportunity.
The Technical Co-Founder will defend the technology.
You must confidently explain and justify:
- Technical feasibility
- System architecture and technology choices
- Development costs and timelines
- Infrastructure and scalability
- Security
- Payments and integrations
- Engineering requirements
- Technical risks
- MVP strategy
- Post-investment engineering recruitment
Investors must be able to challenge the architecture and receive a credible answer from the person who designed it.
Exceptional professional communication skills are essential.
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DEVELOPMENT ARCHITECTURE
Following selection and detailed project disclosure, the Technical Co-Founder will take responsibility for the complete technical development architecture and engineering plan.
This will cover:
- Overall system architecture and technology stack
- Frontend/backend architecture
- Database and search architecture
- Real-time functionality
- Payments and external integrations
- Authentication and identity
- Media, messaging and notifications
- Administration systems
- Security
- Cloud infrastructure / DevOps
- Analytics and scaling
- MVP and production architecture
- Development phases
- Engineering requirements and costs
- Technical risks
- Development timeline
The architecture will be independently reviewed and stress-tested before being relied upon during investor discussions.
The CTO must be comfortable having technical decisions challenged. If we tell investors the product can be built, we intend to be able to prove it.
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TWO FOUNDER PATHS
PATH A — TECHNICAL CO-FOUNDER / CTO
Join as Technical Co-Founder and, before financing, take ownership of:
- Technical architecture and feasibility
- Engineering strategy and roadmap
- Investment preparation
- Technical due diligence
- Investor meetings
Following successful investment, assume the full-time salaried Chief Technology Officer role and lead the production build and engineering organisation.
This route carries substantial founder equity.
PATH B — TECHNICAL CO-FOUNDER + PRE-INVESTMENT MVP
A candidate with the time and capability may instead personally build an agreed working MVP before external financing.
Because this represents substantially greater sweat equity, execution risk and pre-investment value creation, a candidate successfully delivering the agreed MVP may negotiate greater founder equity.
MVP scope, milestones and acceptance criteria will be agreed before development.
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EQUITY & FOUNDER STRUCTURE
The successful candidate will receive substantial founder equity. We are deliberately not specifying a percentage publicly.
The package will depend upon experience, capability, commitment, pre-investment contribution, MVP contribution and long-term responsibility.
The Founder/CEO and Technical Co-Founder will agree their ownership positions before approaching investors. The agreed structure will be reflected in the company's cap table and appropriate founder agreements, including vesting and IP provisions.
The intention is to establish a genuine founding partnership before external capital enters the company.
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SALARY FOLLOWING INVESTMENT
This is currently a pre-investment co-founder opportunity, not an immediately salaried conventional vacancy.
Following successful external investment, the Technical Co-Founder will assume the full-time CTO position.
Post-investment salary will be agreed between the founders within the company's investor-approved operating budget. The CTO will retain their vested founder equity in addition to receiving salary.
We are not looking for somebody cheaply to build a website.
We are looking for a long-term owner and technical leader of the company.
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REMOTE WORKING
The Founder/CEO and target market are based in North Cyprus.
The Technical Co-Founder may work remotely from the United Kingdom and does not need to relocate.
Occasional travel to North Cyprus and/or European investor meetings may be required as the company develops.
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SELECTION PROCESS
Stage 1 — Application
Provide your CV, LinkedIn, GitHub where relevant, portfolio/products and evidence of substantial systems you personally helped build.
Stage 2 — Founder Interview
Selected applicants will be assessed for technical depth, product thinking, communication, commercial awareness, founder mentality and compatibility.
Stage 3 — Confidential Project Disclosure
Strong candidates will receive detailed information including relevant research, product documentation and commercial modelling. Confidentiality arrangements may be required.
We want you to challenge the project: what works, what doesn't, what would you change — and ultimately:
«Can you build it?»
Stage 4 — Technical Selection
The preferred candidate will begin developing the detailed architecture and engineering strategy, which will subsequently undergo appropriate stress-testing.
Stage 5 — Founder Agreement
Founder roles, equity, vesting, IP ownership and responsibilities will be formalised and reflected in the cap table.
Stage 6 — Investment
The Founder/CEO and Technical Co-Founder approach investors together.
One founder sells the commercial opportunity. The other proves it can be built.
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WHO SHOULD NOT APPLY?
Please do not apply if you are:
- A junior or recently qualified developer
- Primarily frontend/design focused
- A project manager without deep engineering capability
- No longer technically hands-on
- Unable to architect complex systems
- Dependent upon other engineers to understand core technology
- Unable to demonstrate substantial previous work
- Looking exclusively for an immediately salaried conventional vacancy
This position carries ownership. The technical standard is intentionally high.
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THE PERSON WE WANT
You may have spent years building valuable technology for other people's companies and reached the point where you want to build something you actually own.
You are technically excellent and still hands-on.
You can architect, build, explain, lead and defend your decisions.
When presented with an ambitious product specification, your reaction isn't:
“Who are we going to hire to build this?”
It's:
“I know how to build this.”
The commercial founder is here. The market research, product definition and investor preparation are underway.
We're looking for the person who can say:
«“You own the commercial side. I'll own the technology. Let's build the company.”»
If that's you, we'd like to hear from you.
Please apply with your CV and evidence of products, platforms or systems you have personally helped build.
Full product details will only be disclosed to suitable shortlisted candidates.
Applicants should contact us via WhatsApp: +90 548 888 9987
Pay: £50,000.00-£70,000.00 per year
Benefits:
Work Location: Remote
