ABOUT DESCARTES UNDERWRITING

Descartes was born out of the conviction that the ever-increasing complexity of risks faced by corporations, governments and vulnerable communities calls for a renewed approach in insurance. Our team brings together industry veterans from the most renowned institutions (AXA, SCOR, Swiss Re, Marsh, Aon, ...) and scientists on top of their field to bring underwriting excellence. After 5 years of existence, Descartes has secured a leading position in parametric insurance for weather and climate-related risks utilizing machine learning, real-time monitoring from satellite imagery & IoT. After a successful Series B raise of $120M USD, we launched Descartes Insurance, a 'full stack' insurer licensed to underwrite risk by the French regulator ACPR. With a growing corporate client base (400+ and counting), our diverse team is headquartered in Paris and operates out of our 17 global offices in North America, Europe, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan. Descartes is trusted by a panel of A-rated (re)insurers to carry out its activities.

ABOUT YOUR ROLE

Due to our consistent growth, we are seeking to expand our Data, Software and DevOps team. 

At the core of our company, as a DevOps Engineer your main assignments will be to make direct contributions to the CI/CD and setup cloud resources to release, deploy, maintain and run our climate risk models. You will also have to provide support to data scientists and software engineers running and developing our models. Your secondary mission will be to connect the external tools to automate the flow of information between the tech and business side.

🔔 KEY MISSIONS 🔔

• Setup, automate, maintain and update:
  • CI/CD pipelines;
  • Data storage process;
  • Package versioning and releasing pipeline;
  • Docker environment;
  • Modularization of code base.
• VM and compute instances:
  • Connections to external and internal APIs;
  • Notification process with chat tools;
  • Website hosting;
  • Assess and evaluate the cost and the security of software architecture and implementation.
• Participate in:
  • Tech stack selection;
  • Discussions with tech partners;
  • Training of tech and underwriting teams;
  • Support and debug of internal users;
  • Management of IAM policies, groups and users.
    
    

TECH STACK 🖥️

• Cloud provider: GCP
• Code versioning tool: Git + Gitlab
• OS: Linux
• Container: Docker
• Container orchestrator: Kubernetes
• Infrastructure as code tool: terraform
• Scripting: bash
• Code base: Python
• Notification tool: Slack

ABOUT YOU

EXPERIENCE & QUALIFICATIONS ‍💻‍💻

[Hard skills]

• Knowledge of the tech stack and demonstrated proficiency in production environments;
• Experience with Docker;
• Experience automating a CI/CD pipeline;
• Fluent in English and in French;

[Soft skills]

• Desire to train junior developers and explain CI/CD and cloud tool;
• Contribute to a rigorous data engineering culture;
• Excellent communication skills, in both formal and informal settings, and in English and French.

[Nice-to-have]

• Experience releasing python package;
• Experience working on data science projects or scientific code;
• Experience in HPC;
• Contribution to an open source project.
  
  

MINDSET 💥

• Strong interest in climate issues (it’s not a hoax, many people suffer from it)
• Being comfortable to work alongside corporate insurers (some still wear suits 👔)
• Willingness to help junior developers (remember how you were when you started 💬)
• Strong team spirit and ability to work (you’ll have to review code and have your code reviewed)
• Rigorous, creative and meticulous mind (we handle large insurance, we take our time)
• Strong desire to learn (there’s no limitation to the tech used, we’re happy to test and learn new tools)
• Eagerness to work in a multi-cultural environment (policies and teams are from all around the world 🗺️)
  
  

WHY JOIN DESCARTES UNDERWRITING?

• Opportunity to work and learn with teams from the most prestigious schools and research labs in the world, allowing you to progress towards technical excellence;
• Commitment from Descartes to its staff of continued learning and development (think annual seminars, training etc.) ;
• Work in a collaborative & professional environment ;
• Be part of an international team, passionate about diversity ;
• Join a company with a true purpose – help us help our clients be more resilient towards climate risks;
• A competitive salary, bonus and benefits;
  
• You can benefit from a punctual home office days.

At Descartes Underwriting, we cherish value of diversity whatever it may be. We are committed to fighting against all forms of discrimination and for equal opportunities. We foster an inclusive work environment that respects all differences.

With equal skills, all our positions are open to people with disabilities.  

RECRUITMENT PROCESS

• Step 1: Call and HR Interview with our Talent Recruiter
• Step 2: Technical project submitted via GitHub
• Step 3: Technical interview
• Step 4: Manager interview
• Step 5: Final round interview with the team
  (Candidates can opt to have the manager interview before the technical project and interview)