Senior Software Engineer, Marketplace Optimization

About the role

You will architect and maintain the core backend services that power Upstart's AI lending marketplace at scale. This role centers on designing systems that enable intelligent borrower-capital matching while optimizing marketplace economics in real time. You will own the development of highly available services that directly influence offer construction, fee optimization, and monetization strategies. Collaboration with Machine Learning, Product, and Capital Markets teams will be essential to translate complex business requirements into resilient technical solutions. You will work on the critical path that determines how offers are presented to borrowers and how marketplace efficiency is measured. Your contributions will impact both the user experience for millions of borrowers and the operational performance of the business. If you are motivated by building systems with measurable financial and operational impact, this is the opportunity to shape the future of AI-powered credit.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Design and implement backend services that serve as the foundation for real-time marketplace decision-making and offer orchestration.
• Build scalable distributed systems that support high-throughput lending workflows while maintaining strict reliability and performance standards.
• Partner with Product and Analytics to define metrics, instrumentation, and experiments that validate marketplace hypotheses and optimization opportunities.
• Develop platform abstractions that allow Monetization and Matching teams to rapidly prototype and deploy new marketplace strategies.
• Improve system observability, debugging capabilities, and operational tooling for production services that support lending decisions.
• Collaborate with Machine Learning engineers to integrate predictive models into offer selection and pricing workflows with robust serving infrastructure.
• Participate in on-call rotations and incident response for critical marketplace services to ensure continuous borrower and capital provider experiences.
• Engage in architecture reviews, design discussions, and cross-team technical planning to align solutions with long-term product goals.
• Write clean, testable code and contribute to shared libraries, tooling, and infrastructure used by multiple teams across the marketplace.
• Mentor junior engineers by providing guidance on system design, coding practices, and operational best practices within the Marketplace Optimization organization.

Requirements

• Hold a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related field, or demonstrate equivalent practical experience.
• Bring a minimum of 5 years of professional software engineering experience focused on backend or distributed systems development.
• Show proven ability to design and operate services that require high availability and low latency in production environments.
• Demonstrate experience with languages and technologies commonly used for large-scale backend systems, including API design and data storage solutions.
• Exhibit strong problem-solving skills when addressing complex tradeoffs between performance, scalability, and business objectives.
• Display comfort working in an agile environment with frequent iterations and evolving requirements from Product and Analytics stakeholders.
• Communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical audiences, including cross-functional partners such as Capital Markets, Lending Partnerships, and Data Analytics.
• Understand the importance of reliability, monitoring, and operational excellence in systems that impact real-time financial decisions.

Nice to have

• Experience building and operating services in cloud environments with container orchestration and infrastructure as code practices.
• Familiarity with experimentation platforms, feature flags, and A/B testing frameworks used to evaluate marketplace behavior.
• Knowledge of financial services concepts related to lending, credit risk, or revenue optimization in marketplace environments.

Practical notes

This is a full-time position based in the United States with remote work eligibility. Most Upstarters perform their duties from remote locations, with flexibility to work from locations across 80+ cities in the US and Canada. In-person collaboration may occur through team onsites, planning sessions, and office-based roles in Columbus, Austin, the Bay Area, or New York City (opening Summer 2026). Travel is not required for this role. The position is eligible for standard U.S. employment authorization, and candidates must ensure they possess the right to work in the United States without sponsorship.