Lead Backend Architect – Node.js, Cloud & AI-5

Realign Llc; Phoenix (AZ); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Realign Llc in Phoenix, AZ seeks a Lead Backend Architect to design and scale cloud-native backends using Node.js/TypeScript, AWS and GCP.

You will lead microservices, APIs, data pipelines, and mentor engineering teams while driving AI integrations such as LLMs, RAG pipelines, and AI observability.

Strong governance, security, and performance focus will guide architecture decisions and collaboration with product and security teams.

Qualifications

• 10+ years designing enterprise backend systems and architectures.
• Deep experience with microservices, REST/gRPC APIs, and event-driven patterns.
• Strong cloud expertise (AWS and/or GCP) and containerized deployments.
• Proven ability to integrate LLMs into enterprise platforms and AI workflows.
• Leadership and mentoring across engineering teams.

Responsibilities

• Lead architecture and implementation of scalable cloud-native backends for Lounge Services.
• Design high-performance microservices and APIs using Node.js/TypeScript on AWS/GCP.
• Define standards for distributed systems, event-driven solutions, and cloud-native apps.
• Drive AI capability adoption by integrating LLMs, RAG pipelines, and AI gateways.
• Create reusable AI platform components including orchestration and observability.
• Provide technical leadership, reviews, and best-practice guidance across teams.

Skills

Backend Architecture

Microservices

AWS

GCP

Kubernetes

Docker

LLM Integration

RAG Pipelines

LangGraph LangChain

AI Governance

Tools

Terraform

REST/gRPC APIs

Kafka

Job description

Job Title: Lead Backend Architect – Node.js, Cloud & AI

Full Time

Job Description

Experience Required - 10+ Years

Must Have Technical/Functional Skills

• 12+ years of experience in designing and building enterprise-scale, cloud-native backend systems and distributed architectures.
• Extensive experience developing microservices, REST/gRPC APIs, event-driven architectures, and scalable backend platforms.
• Strong expertise in AWS and/or GCP, Kubernetes, Docker, cloud-native architecture, and CI/CD pipelines.
• Experience with distributed messaging and streaming technologies such as Kafka, queues, and asynchronous processing.
• Proven experience designing highly available, secure, scalable, and resilient backend systems.
• Strong understanding of databases (SQL/NoSQL), caching, observability, logging, and performance optimization.
• Mandatory experience integrating Large Language Models (LLMs) into enterprise applications and backend platforms.
• Hands-on experience with Agentic AI frameworks such as LangGraph, LangChain, LlamaIndex, CrewAI, or Semantic Kernel.
• Experience building Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines, AI orchestration workflows, and LLM gateways.
• Working knowledge of PyTorch, Hugging Face ecosystem, embeddings, inference, and model evaluation.
• Strong understanding of AI governance, evaluation, safety, and responsible AI practices.
• Excellent architecture, technical leadership, stakeholder management, and mentoring skills.

• Cloud: AWS/GCP
• APIs: REST, gRPC
• Messaging: Kafka or equivalent
• AI Frameworks: LangGraph, LangChain, LlamaIndex, CrewAI, Semantic Kernel

DevOps: CI/CD, Terraform (preferred)

• Lead the architecture, design, and implementation of scalable cloud-native backend platforms for Lounge Services.
• Design and develop high-performance microservices and APIs using Node.js/TypeScript on AWS/GCP.
• Define architecture standards for distributed systems, event-driven solutions, messaging, and cloud-native applications.
• Drive the adoption of AI capabilities by integrating LLMs and Agentic AI into enterprise backend services.
• Design and implement reusable AI platform components including orchestration, RAG pipelines, model gateways, and AI observability.
• Provide technical leadership across engineering teams, driving architecture reviews, engineering best practices, and technology decisions.
• Collaborate with Product, Engineering, Security, and Enterprise Architecture teams to deliver scalable and secure solutions.
• Mentor engineering teams and influence technical direction across multiple initiatives.
• Evaluate emerging backend, cloud, and AI technologies and recommend enterprise adoption where appropriate.

Ensure solutions meet enterprise standards for scalability, reliability, security, performance, and operational excellence.

Job Type: Full Time

Job Category: IT