Chief Technology Officer Full Time

Our client, a leading provider of software solutions in the security and surveillance sector, is seeking an experienced Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to drive their next phase of product innovation and platform modernisation.

The successful CTO will combine deep technical leadership with experience in delivering scalable, secure and high-availability platforms, particularly those handling real-time video, sensor and event data, as they evolve and innovate from legacy systems toward cloud-native, AI-enhanced surveillance solutions.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

●   The CTO will work alongside and in partnership with the CEO and commercial and operational teams to achieve business objectives.

●    Play a full role as a senior manager within the business, including role modelling appropriate behaviours and setting high personal standards of integrity.

●    Be a trusted Board adviser to shape Board and executive understanding of technology risk and opportunity.

●    Advise on long-term technology investment horizons.

●    Be accountable for systemic risk across Product Development

●    Accountable for defining, interpreting and communicating key technology and product health indicators to the executive team and Board.

●    Accountable for defining and enabling the business transformation strategy, including automation, AI-led capabilities, and management of technical debt.

●    Be the technology-facing product and growth leader.

 TECHNOLOGY STRATEGY & EXECUTION

●    Oversee architecture decisions to ensure performance, uptime, cybersecurity, compliance with industry standards (e.g., NDAA, GDPR) and ensure compatibility with enterprise and solutions architectures.

●    Champion the use of modern technologies such as edge computing, computer vision, AI/ML, and cloud storage (e.g., Azure/AWS) where applicable.

●    Evaluate use of team FTEs vs outsourced partners.

PRODUCT COLLABORATION

●    Work with Head of Product Strategy and Chief Strategy Officer to ensure the product vision, strategy and roadmap are agreed by stakeholders, communicated and understood internally and externally with regular reviews.

 PEOPLE, CULTURE AND SUCCESSION

●    Oversee overall performance; lead, grow and inspire the technical teams, reporting on their effectiveness and acting to remedy low performance. Providing advice, guidance and assistance to less experienced colleagues as required.

BUSINESS AND COMMERCIAL ACUMEN

• Strong understanding of:
• Revenue models and cost structures
• Unit economics and ROI of technology investments.
• How technology enables growth, margin, and differentiation.

CRITICAL PERSONAL COMPETENCIES FOR SUCCESS

● Technical/Product: the CTO must have a wide variety of technical knowledge and experience in modern industry standard technologies and software design, and engineering tools and techniques including AI. Able to bring extensive experience of managing the product lifecycle and the successful creation and delivery of Products from concept to release across different markets.

● Strategic and Operational: must have a genuine balance of these core competencies. The vision to create innovative and compelling propositions, combined with practical skills and detailed focus to bring the strategies to fruition. Demonstrable change management skills and experience.

● Collaboration: a team-player who can help shape and execute the business strategy and adhere to collective responsibility within the executive leadership team.

 EXPERIENCE

●    Demonstrable senior technology leadership roles, including enterprise or platform-level accountability, ideally in security, surveillance, IoT, or video technology sectors or could have strong platform or SaaS transferable experience.

●    An understanding of modern product development languages and practices from previous experience is desirable with a software development background being essential, someone who has come through the ranks and understands various SDLC processes.

●    Track record of modernising software architecture and delivering cloud-native products in highly secure, regulated environments.

●    Experience shaping and governing product development at scale, ideally with surveillance, monitoring, or safety applications.

●    Familiarity with video streaming, VMS/NVR systems, edge-device integrations, Data Science is highly advantageous.

●    AI experience is required. A good understanding of AI capabilities is essential

●    Demonstrable platform modernisation experience.

●    Regulated, mission-critical environments is desirable.

●    Scaling products, not just domain depth.

A minimum of 8 years’ experience as a CTO ideally in a mid size software solutions company

EDUCATION

●    Bachelor’s or master’s in computer science, Engineering, or a related field is desirable

●    Additional certifications in cybersecurity, cloud architecture, or product management (e.g., CISSP, AWS Solutions Architect, Pragmatic Institute) are a plus.