Lead Backend Engineer

Summary

Join Catio, a company building the world's first AI-powered Copilot for Tech Architecture, as a Lead Backend Engineer. This high-impact role involves architecting, developing, and optimizing core backend systems, including high-scale data pipelines and AI/ML workflows. You will be a hands-on expert, building scalable services and driving technical leadership. This role extends into "architecture science," shaping the core intelligence of Catio's offering and defining how AI drives architecture expertise. The ideal candidate is a startup-minded engineer with deep expertise in distributed systems, data pipelines, and cloud-native architectures. Catio offers top-tier compensation, significant equity, and leadership opportunities.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in backend engineering at top-tier startups or technology companies, with a strong focus on architecture, data pipelines and ML
• Deep expertise with modern design patterns and software and cloud architectures, distributed systems, and observability best practices for cloud-native architectures
• A strong systems-thinking mindset and a genuine passion for solving architecture challenges experienced by CTOs and developers, and building an AI-powered tech decision intelligence and insight platform
• Experience and practice using AI tools (e.g. Copilot, ChatGPT) in developing code and building products
• Proficiency in modern backend languages and frameworks (e.g. Go, Python), with an interest in polyglot approaches and emerging technologies
• Excellent problem-solving, debugging, and performance optimization skills, with a passion for clean, maintainable code
• A dynamic mindset and high-trust personality, to effectively collaborate cross-functionally at Catio while shaping our grounded geek culture
• Commitment to building in a fast-paced startup environment, shaping the foundation of a category-defining product, and seeing Catio through its bold mission
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Responsibilities

• Design and develop scalable, reliable, and secure backend systems, including data pipelines, backend services, and observability layers, to power the core platform capabilities of Catio’s platform
• Drive ML infrastructure: Collaborate with our AI teams to architect and develop our AI/ML infrastructure and workflows—integrating multi-agent AI workflows, machine learning, and analytics capabilities into our backend services
• Contribute actively to the design of our architecture-focused platform, including identifying the architecture capabilities integral for our customers, identifying the engineering designs which most effectively deliver our architecture value propositions, and actively track and pioneer new architecture best practices to ensure Catio’s platform remains cutting-edge
• Shape our engineering culture: Help establish and promote best practices, mentor engineers, and contribute to hiring and growing a high-trust, high-performance team
• Act as a technical leader within Catio: Drive engineering excellence, ensure high code quality and performance, and foster a culture of continuous improvement
• Stay ahead of emerging technologies: Keep abreast of new developments in tech architectures, backend engineering, data infrastructure, and cloud-native tooling, leveraging them to enhance our product offerings and our platform

Preferred Qualifications

Graduate degree is a bonus

Benefits

Top-tier compensation for startups at our stage, ensuring highly competitive salaries along with significant equity in a rapidly growing, VC-backed company