Backend Engineer - API Team

Sarvam; India; On-site; INR 1,000,000 - 1,500,000; Full time

Job summary

A pioneering generative AI startup in Bengaluru is seeking a Backend Engineer for their API team. The role involves designing and optimizing Python-based APIs for ML models, ensuring low-latency and fault-tolerant systems. Candidates should have strong skills in Python, FastAPI, and experience with cloud environments. Join us to build impactful AI systems for India and beyond.

Qualifications

• Strong proficiency in Python and experience with FastAPI, Django, Flask, or similar frameworks.
• Deep understanding of HTTP, WebSockets, and gRPC protocols.
• Proven experience building low-latency, distributed backend systems.
• Hands-on experience with PostgreSQL, Redis, ClickHouse, or related data systems.
• Familiarity with Kafka or Redis Streams for message handling.
• Solid understanding of API authentication, authorization, and security best practices.
• Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, and CI/CD pipelines.
• Hands-on experience with any major cloud platform (Azure preferred but not mandatory).
• Strong focus on secure coding practices and system reliability.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and optimize Python-based APIs for serving ML models at scale.
• Work with HTTP, WebSockets, and gRPC to build robust communication layers.
• Architect low-latency, fault-tolerant, and secure backend systems.
• Implement authentication, rate limiting, prioritization, and secure coding practices.
• Develop integrations with voice agent SDKs and AI interfaces.
• Work with PostgreSQL, Redis, and ClickHouse for data management.
• Build event-driven and streaming architectures using Kafka and Redis Streams.
• Collaborate on canary deployments and CI/CD pipelines.
• Ensure systems are observable and reliable across multiple cloud environments.

Skills

Python

FastAPI

Django

Flask

HTTP

WebSockets

gRPC

PostgreSQL

Redis

ClickHouse

Kafka

Docker

Kubernetes

CI/CD

Job description

Sarvam.ai is a pioneering generative AI startup headquartered in Bengaluru, India. Our mission is to make generative AI accessible and impactful for Bharat. Founded by a team of AI experts, we are building cost-effective, high-performance AI systems tailored for the Indian market — enabling enterprises to deploy speech, language, and vision models at scale. Join us to build the API backbone that powers the next generation of AI systems for India and beyond.

Job Summary

We are hiring Backend Engineers for our API team, responsible for exposing and managing a family of ML models — ASR, TTS, LLM, Vision models, and more — over high-performance APIs. You will work on building low-latency, fault-tolerant, and cloud-agnostic systems that serve millions of requests reliably, across different infrastructures including Azure, AWS, GCP, and on-prem setups.

Key Responsibilities

Design, develop, and optimize Python-based APIs (FastAPI, Django, Flask, or similar) for serving ML models at scale.

Work with HTTP, WebSockets, and gRPC to build robust communication layers.

Architect low-latency, fault-tolerant, and secure backend systems for real-time inference workloads.

Implement authentication, rate limiting, prioritization, and secure coding practices.

Develop and manage integrations with voice agent SDKs, LLM SDKs, and related AI interfaces.

Work with PostgreSQL, Redis, and ClickHouse for data management and performance optimization.

Build event-driven and streaming architectures using Kafka and Redis Streams.

Collaborate on canary deployments, feature rollouts, and CI/CD pipelines for smooth production releases.

Ensure systems are observable, reliable, and vendor-agnostic across multiple cloud environments.

Must-Have Skills

Strong proficiency in Python and experience with FastAPI, Django, Flask, or similar frameworks.

Deep understanding of HTTP, WebSockets, and gRPC protocols.

Proven experience building low-latency, distributed backend systems.

Hands-on experience with PostgreSQL, Redis, ClickHouse, or related data systems.

Familiarity with Kafka or Redis Streams for message handling.

Solid understanding of API authentication, authorization, and security best practices.

Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, and CI/CD pipelines.

Hands-on experience with any major cloud platform (Azure preferred but not mandatory).

Strong focus on secure coding practices and system reliability.

Good to Have

Experience with canary deployments, progressive rollouts, or feature flag systems.

Prior work with ML inference systems or AI model serving infrastructure.

Familiarity with observability and monitoring tools (Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry).

Contributions to open-source backend projects or a solid GitHub portfolio.