Software Engineer- X Core Product

About the role

SpaceXAI builds artificial intelligence systems designed to interpret the universe and support human knowledge. You will join a 30 person team to develop and scale the X platform, which serves over 600 million global users. In this role, you will own the design and execution of core infrastructure that powers mission critical AI workloads across the platform. You will be responsible for translating ambiguous product requirements into robust, scalable backend systems that enable real time insights and decision making. You will work closely with product managers, data scientists, and infrastructure teams to define technical roadmaps and deliver high impact features on aggressive timelines. You will ensure that the systems you build are reliable, performant, and maintainable as the platform continues to scale globally. You will contribute to architectural reviews and design discussions that shape the long term vision for the X Core Product.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Build and manage backend services, APIs, and data models for high-traffic environments while optimizing for throughput and resilience.
• Collaborate with mobile and web engineers to deploy new product features, ensuring seamless integration across client platforms and consistent user experiences.
• Architect infrastructure for payments, monetization, transaction processing, and user engagement, balancing scalability with operational efficiency.
• Create fullstack components including dashboards, content delivery systems, and real-time analytics to support data driven decision making.
• Make technical decisions regarding system architecture, concurrency, and latency, evaluating tradeoffs between performance, complexity, and maintainability.
• Maintain high standards for code quality, security, monitoring, and deployment by implementing best in class practices and enforcing robust testing strategies.
• Partner with data science teams to integrate machine learning models into production pipelines, focusing on inference performance and data integrity.
• Design and operate observability frameworks that provide insight into system behavior, enabling rapid troubleshooting and proactive capacity planning.
• Lead efforts to refactor legacy components, modernizing them to leverage current technologies and improve long term agility.
• Contribute to open source initiatives and internal tooling where appropriate, helping to establish engineering standards across the organization.
• Mentor junior engineers by providing guidance on system design, coding practices, and problem solving techniques.
• Participate in on call rotations to support production incidents, driving resolution and postmortem processes to prevent future occurrences.
• Evaluate emerging technologies and frameworks, assessing their potential impact on the platform and proposing adoption strategies.
• Coordinate with cross functional stakeholders to align technical delivery with business objectives and market demands.

Requirements

• 2+ years of professional experience building large-scale consumer applications, with a proven track record of delivering reliable software to production.
• Expertise in distributed systems for low-latency, high-volume environments, including understanding of consistency models, replication, and fault tolerance.
• Proficiency in Rust, Go, Python, or Java, with the ability to write clean, efficient, and maintainable code in at least one of these languages.
• Experience with high-volume streaming systems, such as Kafka or similar platforms, including designing pipelines and managing data flow.
• Strong understanding of networking fundamentals, including HTTP, TCP/IP, and common internet protocols that underpin modern distributed applications.
• Familiarity with containerization and orchestration tools, particularly Docker and Kubernetes, to manage deployment and scaling of services.
• Ability to read and interpret technical specifications, turning high level concepts into detailed implementation plans.
• Commitment to following security best practices, including data protection, authentication, and authorization mechanisms.

Nice to have

• 5+ years of experience in large-scale consumer software or as a founding engineer at an early-to-mid stage startup, with exposure to rapid growth scenarios.
• Background in rapid prototyping, AI integration, and user-centric design, demonstrating an ability to iterate quickly while maintaining usability.
• Experience contributing to open source projects or leading technical initiatives that have positively impacted large user bases.
• Knowledge of machine learning operations and tools for deploying and monitoring AI driven systems in production.
• Familiarity with financial services or transaction processing systems, providing insight into payments, compliance, and regulatory considerations.
• Demonstrated ability to communicate technical concepts to non technical audiences, bridging gaps between engineering and business teams.

Practical notes

• Salary range: $180,000 - $440,000 USD.
• Total rewards include equity, medical, dental, and vision insurance.
• Benefits include 401(k) retirement plan, life insurance, and disability coverage.
• SpaceXAI is an equal opportunity employer.
• This role is based in Palo Alto, California, and requires relocation or local candidacy for onsite work.
• Full-time engagement is expected, with availability during standard business hours for collaboration and on call responsibilities.
• Candidates must be authorized to work in the United States without sponsorship for this position.