Senior Backend Engineer (Golang)

Kunai; United States; Remote; USD 140,000 - 170,000; Full time

Job summary

Kunai is building a data abstraction layer over core banking data, enabling safe, consistent access for downstream applications. You'll craft Go services that transform core data into usable models and design robust data-access patterns that integrate with other teams’ APIs and events.

The role emphasizes backend engineering, data modeling, and collaboration with a Profile team to ensure scalable, secure data delivery across modern fintech systems.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of backend engineering experience with Go as primary language.
• Experience building integration or platform layers between legacy systems and modern applications.
• Experience with event-driven architectures (Kafka, CDC).
• Experience provisioning cloud services in AWS.

Responsibilities

• Design and build Go services that transform data from core systems into a consistent downstream model.
• Collaborate with engineers to define clean extraction points from the core banking data model.
• Build and maintain the access layer (APIs or event streams) for data consumers.
• Enforce data integrity, access boundaries, and schema versioning to prevent ripple effects.
• Integrate with existing API endpoints and extend data product interfaces as needed.
• Help decide data product delivery modes: batch, event-driven, or real-time APIs.
• Work with data engineers to make new data products viewable and queryable downstream.

Skills

Go

Backend development

System integration

Education

Bachelor’s Degree

Tools

AWS

Kafka

CDC

Job description

Kunai builds full-stack technology solutions for banks, credit and payment networks, infrastructure providers, and their customers. Together, we are changing the world’s relationship with financial services. At Kunai, we help our clients modernize, capitalize on emerging trends, and evolve their business for the coming decades by remaining tech-agnostic and human-centered.

We're building a new abstraction layer that gives applications — regardless of language — safe, consistent access to data living in our core banking system, without those applications ever needing to interact with the core directly. This layer sits between our banking core and every downstream data product and application that consumes its data.

You’ll join as a Senior Backend Engineer working primarily in Go. You’ll partner closely with our Profile Engineer, who owns the core-side implementation in FIS Profile's proprietary scripting language (PSL), while you build the integration layer that sits in front of it. You won’t be writing new product-facing API endpoints — your focus is the layer underneath: data extraction, modeling, and the access patterns that let other teams’ applications consume this data safely.

What you’ll do

• Design and build Go services that transform data surfaced from our core banking system into a consistent model usable by any downstream application
• Partner with our Profile engineer and data engineers to define clean extraction points from the core — you won’t write PSL yourself, but you’ll need to understand enough of the data model and business-process mapping to design the right abstraction around it
• Build and maintain the access layer (APIs and/or event streams) that lets other teams integrate with this data without touching the core directly
• Enforce data integrity, access boundaries, and schema versioning so changes in the core don’t ripple out to every consuming application
• Integrate with existing API endpoints maintained by other teams — this role extends and consumes APIs, it does not originate new product-facing endpoints
• Help define whether new data products are served via batch, event-driven (e.g. Kafka/CDC), or real-time APIs, depending on freshness requirements
• Collaborate with data engineers on the same team to make new data products viewable/queryable downstream

What we’re looking for

• 5+ years of backend engineering experience, with Go as your primary/preferred language
• Experience building integration, abstraction, or platform layers that sit between legacy systems of record and modern consuming applications
• Comfort working with transactional systems and/or payments
• Experience with event-driven architectures like Kafka and CDC pipelines
• Prior exposure to legacy core banking systems is a plus, though we don’t expect Go engineers to write Profile/PSL themselves
• Experience provisioning cloud services in AWS or other providers

US Remote · Compensation depends on location but is generally between 140 - 170k base with an up-to 20% annual bonus.

Our success over the past 20 years is rooted in our exceptional team, which thrives in a culture of collaboration, creativity, and continuous learning.

We are proud to offer our employees a range of benefits, including competitive compensation, professional development opportunities, and flexible work arrangements, all designed to help them thrive. As we continue to expand, we remain committed to cultivating an environment where people feel valued, have a voice, and are given the tools to grow—both personally and professionally—while pushing the boundaries of innovation in the fintech industry.

Minimum Degree Required:

• Bachelor’s Degree, in lieu of a degree, demonstrating in addition to the minimum years of experience required for the role, three years of specialized training and/or progressively responsible work experience in technology for each missing year of college isrequired