We are a startup building a secure corporate messenger based on Matrix. We are looking for an iOS Team Lead who will take responsibility for the speed, quality, and predictability of our mobile platform development. We have tight deadlines due to an upcoming release, so we need someone who can "quickly get up to speed", bypassing onboarding rules, and successfully orchestrate an experienced and strong team. We are not looking for a "senior who occasionally reviews code". We are looking for a leader who knows how to build processes, hire people, and ensure development transparency, while remaining technically proficient enough to make sound architectural decisions.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Team and process management: establishing the development cycle, task decomposition, backlog management, deadline transparency.
• Release management: mastering the release process, CI/CD, crash-free metrics, quick hotfixes.
• Synchronization with upstream: strategy for working with the fork, merging upstream, minimizing divergence.
• Mentorship and hiring: participation in hiring iOS developers, onboarding, mentoring, code reviews, raising the quality bar.
• Backend interaction: critical reading of specifications, identifying contradictions in API contracts.
• Designing the architecture of the iOS client (SwiftUI, iOS 17+) and integration with the Rust core (FFI/Swift Package) — it's not necessary to write Rust, but to understand the boundaries.
• Control of complex areas: state machines, network logic (retries, idempotency, caching), WKWebView, push notifications.

What we expect from you (minimum technical foundation):

• 3+ years of commercial iOS development, project entirely in SwiftUI (UIKit — spot usage).
• Confident command of concurrency: async/await, structured concurrency, actor isolation.
• Experience writing the network layer manually: pagination, request idempotency, semantic error handling, retries with backoff.
• Ability to design and test state machines, unit tests for parsing and transitions — part of the Definition of Done.
• Understanding of push infrastructure: Notification Service Extension, extension limitations, payload parsing.
• English B1+ (reading documentation, correspondence).
• Team management experience (team lead, mentoring) - the most important aspect.

Will be a plus:

• Experience with Matrix, matrix-rust-sdk, or other E2EE messengers.
• Experience supporting open-source project forks and upstream integration strategies.
• Familiarity with XcodeGen, SwiftLint, CI setup (including self-hosted runners).
• Applied cryptography (AES-GCM, keychain, understanding client-side threats).
• Experience with AI-assisted development (Claude Code, Cursor) and willingness to implement these processes.

Conditions:

• Fully remote work, flexible schedule with asynchronous communication within Moscow time (10 AM to 7 PM).
• Salary: from 3500 to 5500 dollars (negotiable based on interview results).
• Payments twice a month.
• Minimum bureaucracy, direct influence on architecture and team formation.

Selection Process:

• HR Screening.
• Interview with CEO, CPO, CHRO, HoF.
• Optionally, a technical interview with the Head of Frontend may be possible.
• Offer.

📩 Apply via Telegram: viktoria_ihr - send your resume immediately