Software Engineer, Frontend

About the role

Sift builds data infrastructure for hardware engineering teams working on rockets, satellites, and autonomous systems. As a frontend engineer, you will be responsible for developing the user interface for Sift Agents, an AI-powered tool designed to automate telemetry analysis and detect anomalies in complex machine data. This role involves taking ownership of product features from conception through deployment, working closely with customers to understand their workflows, and translating those needs into intuitive, high-performance frontend interfaces. You will collaborate with backend engineers, UI/UX designers, and other team members to create scalable, reliable, and polished user experiences that enable engineers to interpret large datasets efficiently and accurately. The position offers an exciting opportunity to work on cutting-edge AI products in a hardware-focused environment, contributing to critical systems used in aerospace and autonomous technology.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Conduct interviews with customers to understand their hardware review workflows and identify how to translate these into functional capabilities within the Sift Agents platform.
• Design, develop, and refine frontend interfaces that support agentic interactions, including real-time streaming responses, long-running task management, and complex data visualizations.
• Optimize browser performance to ensure smooth rendering of agent findings alongside massive real-time datasets, minimizing latency and enhancing user experience.
• Manage the entire lifecycle of product features, from initial minimum viable product (MVP) development to iterative updates based on user feedback and testing.
• Collaborate with backend engineers to define and refine API structures that facilitate seamless communication between frontend components and backend services.
• Maintain and improve the internal component library to promote UI consistency, reusability, and adherence to design standards.
• Implement advanced browser techniques such as Web Workers and OPFS-backed caching to bypass framework limitations and improve performance for data-heavy applications.
• Gather ongoing user feedback to inform feature prioritization, UI improvements, and bug fixes, ensuring the product evolves to meet customer needs.
• Write clean, maintainable, and well-documented code, following best practices for frontend development and testing.
• Support cross-team initiatives to improve overall platform stability, scalability, and security.
• Participate in code reviews, team meetings, and planning sessions to align development efforts with product goals.
• Contribute to UI/UX design discussions to enhance usability and accessibility for technical users.
• Create and maintain documentation related to frontend architecture, component usage, and best practices.
• Assist in troubleshooting and debugging frontend issues across browsers and devices to maintain high-quality user experiences.
• Stay informed about emerging frontend technologies, tools, and trends relevant to real-time data visualization and AI workflows.

Requirements

• Minimum of 3 years of professional experience in software engineering, with a focus on frontend development.
• Proven expertise in building complex, high-performance web applications using React, Next.js, and TypeScript.
• Strong attention to micro-interactions, interface polish, and overall user experience.
• Demonstrated ability to take full ownership of a product area, including gathering requirements, designing solutions, and shipping features.
• Active interest in AI products, agentic workflows, and related technologies.
• Must be a U.S. Person (citizen, permanent resident, asylee, or refugee) to comply with ITAR/EAR regulations.
• Experience working with large datasets and real-time data visualization techniques.
• Knowledge of frontend performance optimization strategies and browser rendering techniques.
• Ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams, including backend engineers, product managers, and designers.
• Excellent problem-solving skills and attention to detail.
• Strong communication skills, capable of translating technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
• Familiarity with version control systems such as Git and continuous integration tools.
• Ability to work in a fast-paced environment and adapt to changing priorities.

Nice to have

• Experience deploying products that handle large data volumes or high user concurrency.
• Background in developing features powered by large language models (LLMs) or chat interfaces.
• Knowledge of web performance tuning and rendering optimization techniques.
• Proficiency with Tailwind CSS and Radix UI component libraries.
• Experience with web visualization tools such as WebGL, D3.js, or Apache ECharts.
• Familiarity with WebAssembly and handling time-series data for visualization or analysis.
• Experience building dashboards or data editing environments tailored for technical users.
• Personal projects involving AI agents, developer tools, or scientific computing.
• Background in hardware telemetry, scientific computing, or related fields.

Skills & tools

• Frontend: React, TypeScript, Redux, Tailwind, WebAssembly, D3.js, WebGL
• Backend: Go
• Data: Parquet, Flink, Kafka, Redpanda, Beam, DuckDB, Timescale, QuestDB, InfluxDB, Druid
• Infrastructure: GitHub Actions, AWS, Azure, GCP, Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform

Practical notes

The team meets in person twice weekly at the Marina Del Rey office, fostering collaboration and team bonding. Additionally, there is a full-week team gathering every two months to align on goals and share progress. Candidates may choose to work from the Los Angeles headquarters or the San Francisco office, depending on preference and availability. This role requires strict adherence to ITAR/EAR regulations, and candidates must be U.S. Persons to qualify. The position offers an engaging environment for engineers interested in AI, real-time data visualization, and hardware telemetry, with a focus on building impactful tools for aerospace and autonomous systems.