Senior Staff Software Engineer, API
Leads technical strategy and execution for Claude API platform, driving multi-year roadmap across core, capabilities, knowledge, distributability, and agents teams. Requires 12+ years experience in distributed systems and API architecture.
Responsibilities
- Define and drive multi-year technical strategy for the Claude API, setting direction across API Core, Capabilities, Knowledge, Distributability, and Agents.
- Identify and personally lead the highest-complexity, highest-impact engineering initiatives spanning multiple teams.
- Serve as the primary technical decision-maker for major architectural decisions with org-wide scope.
- Partner with Research to evaluate and integrate frontier capabilities; work with Inference and Platform for reliable delivery at scale; collaborate with Infrastructure and Safeguards for reliability, security, and responsible deployment.
- Mentor and develop Staff-level engineers across the org.
- Drive alignment across Product, GTM, Safety, and beyond while proactively identifying and addressing systemic technical risks.
You may be a good fit if you:
- Have 12+ years of engineering experience with a clear track record operating at Staff or Senior Staff level.
- Have demonstrably shaped technical strategy for large-scale API or distributed systems platforms.
- Drive the highest-leverage technical outcomes without formal authority—you lead through influence, quality of thinking, and trust.
- Have deep expertise in distributed systems and API architecture, and are effective writing design docs, making architectural calls, and coding in critical paths.
- Are highly effective across org boundaries—you build trust with Research, Inference, Infrastructure, Safeguards, and business stakeholders alike.
- Bring strong product instincts and a craftsperson's approach to API design; you communicate clearly with both technical and non-technical audiences.
Technical Stack
- Languages: Python, TypeScript
- Frameworks: FastAPI, React
- Infrastructure: GCP, Kubernetes, Cloud Run, AWS, Azure
- Databases: PostgreSQL (AlloyDB), Vector Stores, Firestore
- Tools: Feature Flagging, Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog
Software Engineer, Platform, Tinker
Builds platform systems for AI fine-tuning API including billing, metering, authorization (RBAC/OAuth), organizations/teams, data exports, and audit logging. Requires backend proficiency in Python/Rust and experience in billing, access control, or multi-tenant systems; bachelor's or equivalent.
Software Engineer, Foundations Retrieval
Software Engineer building and scaling retrieval infrastructure for AI models, including indexing, serving, and query execution systems. Partners with researchers to productionize embedding techniques and supports agentic workflows across OpenAI products.
Staff+ Software Engineer, Backend
Staff backend engineer owns scalable systems for Anthropic's API, Claude.ai, and developer tools across teams like API Core and Enterprise Foundations. Requires 8+ years experience leading complex projects, distributed systems, and cross-team alignment in fast-paced AI environment.
Principal Software Engineer, B2B Engineering
Leads architecture and scaling of backend services, APIs, distributed systems, databases, and data pipelines for OpenAI's developer platform and enterprise products. Requires deep expertise in backend engineering, reliability, security, and cross-team collaboration in fast-paced environments.
Software Engineer, Collective Communication
Designs and implements custom networking collectives using C++ and CUDA for efficient AI model training on supercomputers. Requires expertise in low-level performance-critical software, RDMA distributed algorithms, and GPU/CPU code.