Java backend and full-stack engineers. The online store's services, from search and the product catalogue to the cart, the order and the store's stock, are built in Java with Spring Boot. Java is much the largest role, well above its share across the GCCs and more than twice its share at product companies. Most of the work is backend, with a full-stack minority that also writes React. The postings say what kind of store this is. Kafka carries the stream of orders and stock changes, Cassandra and Elasticsearch hold the catalogue and power search, and GraphQL serves the app. Azure and Google Cloud are each required more often than AWS, unlike at the banks.

Cloud and DevOps engineers. A large retailer runs its online store on its own cloud platform, and the Black Friday rush has to land on infrastructure that will not fall over. Cloud and DevOps engineers build and run that platform with Kubernetes, Terraform and Grafana on Azure and Google Cloud. An unusually large share of the postings require Go, and many require Java, because these engineers also write the platform's own services. A small group of network engineers sits mostly at Tesco. The role holds about its usual weight across the GCCs and at product companies.

Data engineers. A retailer lives on what it sold yesterday, what is on the shelf today and what to order for next week. Data engineers build the pipelines behind those answers, in Python and Java with Spark, Scala, Hadoop, Hive, Airflow and Kafka, on Databricks and Google's BigQuery. They are about twice their weight at product companies, and are hired almost entirely with experience.

Mobile engineers. The retailer's app is its shop window, and this is the one Parent Industry where mobile is a major role. Mobile engineers build the shopping apps in Kotlin and Jetpack Compose for Android, Swift and SwiftUI for iOS, and React Native for both, and many postings require GraphQL. The role is about twice its weight across the GCCs and well above its weight at product companies. Walmart and Tesco hold most of it, and Tesco hires mobile engineers in close to the same numbers as Walmart, though it is far smaller overall.

Frontend engineers and JavaScript and Node full-stack engineers. The website is built in React. Frontend engineers build the shop's web screens, and their postings often require WCAG, the standard for making websites usable by people with disabilities, because a shop must serve every shopper. JavaScript and Node full-stack engineers build the same screens together with the Node services behind them, in TypeScript with Express and GraphQL. Both roles are above their weight across the GCCs. The Node work leans to Tesco.

GenAI engineers. Retail AI work is about search and the shopper, such as understanding a three-word query, writing product descriptions, and assistants for shoppers and store staff. GenAI engineers build it in Python and Java with LangChain, LangGraph and Google's Vertex AI. The role is smaller here than across the GCCs, and almost all of it is at Walmart. Without Walmart, GenAI is a minor role in retail.

SAP engineers and the other business platforms. This is the consumer-goods and fashion side, together with Walmart's own back office. SAP engineers configure and extend SAP with ABAP, S/4HANA, Fiori and IDoc. SAP is several times its weight at product companies and almost twice its weight across the GCCs, because retail and consumer goods run on it as the banks do not. Walmart hires the most SAP engineers of any centre in the GCC world, for its own finance and supply chain, and Mondelēz, H&M and Columbia Sportswear hire them too. Salesforce engineers build in Apex and Lightning Web Components, mostly at Mattel and Columbia Sportswear, and some postings require Agentforce, Salesforce's AI agents. ServiceNow engineers, at Walmart, H&M and 7-Eleven, build IT requests and internal workflows. Low-code and automation developers build internal tools with the Power Platform and software robots, at MillerKnoll and Tesco's back office. The largest part, though, is enterprise application work, building and connecting business systems in ordinary code rather than on a packaged platform, in SQL and Java on Azure and Google Cloud, at Walmart, Mattel, Tesco and Lowe's. Mattel, H&M, Columbia Sportswear and MillerKnoll are where this work is the main hiring.

Software Engineer, Security. Software engineers who specialise in security: they build login systems, cloud and network protections, and the checks that keep code safe. In retail they are mostly identity and access engineers, who build how shoppers and staff sign in, with OAuth, OpenID Connect, SAML and LDAP. Almost all of them are at Walmart. The role is above its weight across the GCCs, though below its weight at product companies. It is hired only with experience.

Test engineers. Testing is a small role here, far below its weight at product companies, because the large centres fold testing into engineering. Walmart, 7-Eleven and Staples hire the most testers, and the whole-function centres of the mid-sized chains, like Williams-Sonoma, 7-Eleven and Staples, hire them in the largest proportion. They automate in Java with JUnit, Selenium, Playwright, Cypress, REST Assured and Appium for the apps.

.NET engineers. .NET is rare in retail's large centres. It belongs to H&M, Costco, General Mills and Staples, in C# on Azure with React or Angular on top.

Generalist software engineers. Some postings name a language rather than a product, mostly Java, Python and JavaScript. One group at Tesco describes the business process the engineer will support rather than any technology. Others are ordinary backend work in Java and Spring Boot at a retailer, and appear at Walmart and the mid-sized chains, Williams-Sonoma, H&M, Costco and Staples.

Also present. ML engineers for forecasting and classical models, mostly at Tesco. A small group of C/C++ systems engineers at Walmart who work close to the operating system with the Linux kernel and Rust, far below their usual weight. Mainframe programmers on the AS/400 at Staples and Mattel. Power Platform engineers and automation tools such as UiPath at Tesco's back office. Python and Go backend engineers in small numbers. A handful of embedded firmware engineers.

Rare here. Chip design does not appear.