# Staff Software Engineer

**Company:** [Confluent](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/confluent)
**Location:** Remote
**Role:** ML Engineering
**Salary:** $236k – $277k/yr
**Experience:** 10+ years
**Skills:** Go, Java, Python, Kubernetes, Distributed Systems, cloud native, containerization, Networking, model serving, llm infrastructure, streaming data systems
**Posted:** 2026-07-22

> Build and operate backend services for AI and model inference on Confluent's real-time streaming data platform. Own end-to-end feature delivery across model lifecycle, inference routing, and agent execution with strong distributed systems expertise.

## Job Description

## What You Will Do
- Design and build the backend services (primarily Go, Java, and Python) that run AI and model inference on real-time data.
- Own features end to end — drafting the design, aligning stakeholders inside and outside the team, and driving the decision to a conclusion.
- Make the technical calls on systems that span teams: model lifecycle, inference routing, and agent execution.
- Own the quality of what you ship — code, test coverage, documentation, operability, and rollout safety. This is production infrastructure serving live inference, so reliability isn't an afterthought.
- Make the engineers around you better through code review, design feedback, and being someone the team trusts with ambiguous, cross-cutting work.
- Participate in on-call for the services your team owns, and help keep the team's processes and rituals healthy.

## What You Will Bring
- 10+ years of significant experience designing, building, and operating distributed systems or cloud-native backend infrastructure in production.
- Strong working knowledge of Kubernetes and distributed-systems patterns (control loops, API servers, high-scale control planes), plus the fundamentals — containerization, networking, resource isolation.
- Proficiency in at least one of Go, Java, or Python, and the willingness to work across all three.
- A track record of leading cross-team technical work: turning ambiguous requirements into designs others can rally behind.
- Excellent written and verbal communication — you can write a design doc that aligns people who don't report to you.

## What Gives You an Edge
- Exposure to model serving, LLM/agent infrastructure, or streaming data systems.
- You don't need a background in ML research or model training — this role is about building and operating the platform that serves AI reliably at scale, not inventing the models.

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**Apply:** https://hotfix.jobs/jobs/a1dd767e-3d27-40b5-bb17-9a5f3a5afe35
**Canonical:** https://hotfix.jobs/jobs/a1dd767e-3d27-40b5-bb17-9a5f3a5afe35