Senior Data Engineer

XYZ Venture Capital; Costa Mesa (CA); Hybrid; USD 166,000 - 220,000; Full time

Job summary

Anduril Industries is seeking a Data Engineer to design and implement data pipelines and models that power our next generation technologies for national security. You will help shape the data platform and collaborate across operations, product, and engineering to deliver scalable solutions.

You will own ingest/egress pipelines, work with Palantir Foundry, and enable best practices with SQLMesh, Athena, and Iceberg. This role emphasizes hands-on leadership and impact in a defense-focused mission.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of data engineering experience delivering data products in a fast-paced environment.
• Motivated by defense-related mission and impactful work.
• Strong programming foundations in Python or similar language.
• Experience with Spark, PySpark, SQL and dbt.
• Experience with Palantir Foundry or similar Enterprise Data Platforms.
• Willingness to develop data services and data products.
• Experience with cloud security tooling across AWS/GCP/Azure and containerization.

Responsibilities

• Lead design and roadmap for the data platform.
• Collaborate with operations, product, and engineering to implement best practices and infrastructure for data needs.
• Own ingest and egress pipelines stitching data sources into valuable products for the business.
• Utilize Palantir Foundry as the central hub for data applications and analytics at scale.
• Use SQLMesh for data transformations and enable version control, testing, and CI/CD for data pipelines.
• Query data with Athena and leverage Iceberg for schema evolution and time travel queries.
• Orchestrate with Flyte in a Kubernetes-native environment; act as player-coach while contributing hands-on.

Skills

Python

Spark

PySpark

SQL

dbt

Tableau

Cloud platforms

Palantir Foundry

Tools

Palantir Foundry

Airflow

Flyte

AWS/GCP/Azure security

Job description

Anduril Industries is a defense technology company with a mission to transform U.S. and allied military capabilities with advanced technology. By bringing the expertise, technology, and business model of the 21st century’s most innovative companies to the defense industry, Anduril is changing how military systems are designed, built and sold. Anduril’s family of systems is powered by Lattice OS, an AI‑powered operating system that turns thousands of data streams into a real‑time 3D command and control center. As the world enters an era of strategic competition, Anduril is committed to bringing cutting‑edge autonomy, AI, computer vision, sensor fusion, and networking technology to the military in months, not years.

ABOUT THE TEAM

As a Data Engineer on the Analytics Team, you will be collaborating with stakeholders across the company to design, build and implement data pipelines and models that enable our next generation of technology to be deployed around the world. You will also shape the current and future vision of the entire data platform. The Analytics space is engrained in our team’s DNA, as we regularly discuss shifts in the industry and keep up with the top relevant blogs. If this culture and Anduril’s mission speaks to you, you’ve found the right place.

ABOUT THE JOB

We’re looking for Data Engineers who are seeking high impact collaborative roles focused on driving operational execution. Ideally you are looking to learn what it takes to build the next generation of defense technology.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Lead the design and roadmap for our data platform
• Partner with operations, product, and engineering to advocate best practices and build supporting systems and infrastructure for the various data needs
• Own the ingest and egress frameworks for data pipelines that stitch together various data sources in order to produce valuable data products that drive the business
• Palantir Foundry is our central hub for data driven applications, visualizations and large scale data analysis across the Anduril org. We manage a large user base and provide true data self service at scale.
• We use SQLMesh for data transformations, giving our engineers the ability to work with SQL while enjoying software engineering best practices like version control, testing, and CI/CD for data pipelines.
• For querying data, we utilize Athena, an AWS serverless solution that allows our team to run analytics directly on our data lake without managing infrastructure.
• We’ve implemented Apache Iceberg as our table format, providing advanced data management capabilities like schema evolution and time travel queries.
• We use Flyte for orchestration. It is a highly scalable, kubernetes native modern orchestration platform similar to Airflow or Dagster.
• Operate in a "player‑coach" capacity, leading members of the team, while remaining hands on as a contributor

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

• 3+ years of experience in a data engineering role building products, ideally in a fast‑paced environment
• You are motivated by our mission. We are working to solve the biggest problems in defense
• Good foundations in Python or another language
• Experience with Spark, PySpark, SQL and dbt
• Experience with Enterprise Data Systems like Palantir Foundry
• Experience with or interest in learning how to develop data services and data products
• Experience with AWS, Azure, or GCP security ecosystem, containerization, and associated tooling
• Knowledge of data & visualization tools, such as Tableau
• Understand the importance of engineering with security’s best practices in mind
• You are empathetic: you are eager to see the world from your users’ perspective
• You’re energized by business impact & a self-starter: you love to drive the direction of ambiguous projects
• Drive to take ownership of and debug complex data transformation pipelines and data models
• Must be a U.S. Person due to required access to U.S. export controlled information or facilities

Benefits

At Anduril, we invest in our people. Our comprehensive, competitive benefits package (available at little to no cost to employees) ensures you’re supported in health, recovery, and whatever comes next.

US Salary Range: $166,000 - $220,000 USD

The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors, inclusive of base salary only. Actual salary offer may vary based on (but not limited to) work experience, education and/or training, critical skills, and/or business considerations. Highly competitive equity grants are included in the majority of full time offers; and are considered part of Anduril’s total compensation package. Additionally, Anduril offers top‑tier benefits for full-time employees, including: