Senior Data Engineer

Apple Inc.; Cupertino (CA); On-site; USD 185,000 - 325,000; Full time

Job summary

Apple Inc. is seeking a senior data engineer to own the data lakehouse, turning device and compute events into reliable, fast-to-query tables.

You will build Spark pipelines, design Iceberg tables, and enable dashboards through Trino while maintaining data quality and schema evolution. You’ll collaborate with data analysts, full-stack engineers, and application teams, taking over ingestion from Kafka and optimizing performance.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• 7+ years of professional data engineering experience building production data pipelines at scale.
• Proficiency in Java or Scala, and strong SQL.
• Production experience with Apache Spark, including batch and streaming.
• Strong data modeling skills with analytics schemas on Iceberg or lakehouse formats.
• Experience building data quality checks and monitoring for production pipelines.
• Productive use of AI coding tools with validation of generated code.

Responsibilities

• Build and run Spark streaming and batch pipelines in Scala or Java, including backfills.
• Design lakehouse tables and layouts to enable fast querying via Trino.
• Validate incoming events, handle schema changes, and manage dead-letter routing.
• Define and enforce data quality with a data analyst, monitor freshness and completeness.
• Partner with dashboards engineers to design tables and queries behind dashboards.
• Take over Kafka-to-Iceberg ingestion and improve performance and cost.
• Join on-call rotation for data lakehouse incidents and mentor engineers.

Skills

Apache Spark

Java/Scala

SQL

Data modeling

Data quality checks

AI coding tools

Kubernetes

Iceberg

Trino

Kafka

Flink

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field

Tools

Apache Iceberg

Trino

Kafka

Flink

Kubernetes

Job description

Cupertino, California, United States Software and Services

At Apple, we find joy in solving hard problems, and we are motivated by curiosity to keep making our products better. Apple Services Engineering's Device Compute Analytics team provides the data foundation for Apple's internal device cloud, which supports all of Apple's hardware, software, and services. Our work helps Apple ship entirely new products and features, and gives teams the data to keep existing ones meeting a high standard. We are looking for a senior data engineer to own our data lakehouse: turning a stream of device and compute events into data that is accurate, timely, and easy to explore. You will build the pipelines and table designs that power forecasting, capacity planning, and fair cross-charging across the organization, and help us spot issues before an internal customer ever notices them. Join a high-performing team, work with colleagues across Apple, and make data that people across the company rely on.

Description

You will own the data lakehouse that turns raw device and compute events into reliable, fast-to-query tables. You will build and run the Spark pipelines, design the tables that dashboards query through Trino, and put in place the checks that keep the data accurate and timely. Over time, you will also take over the ingestion of those events from Kafka. Our services publish events describing device lifecycle, job and session activity, provisioning, and failures, and those events land in Iceberg. You will turn them into datasets people can trust and build on, working with a data analyst and a full-stack engineer (who builds the dashboards) on the team, as well as application engineers and teams across Apple.

Responsibilities

• Build and run Spark streaming and batch pipelines in Scala or Java, including backfills when data issues are found or new transformations are added for past events
• Design lakehouse tables and layouts (partitioning, sort order, compaction, schema evolution) so dashboards can query Iceberg quickly through Trino
• Validate incoming events, handle schema changes, and route malformed or unknown events to a dead-letter path for review and replay
• Define and enforce data quality with a data analyst: keep schemas and data contracts under version control with compatibility checks in CI, monitor freshness, completeness, duplicates, and late arrivals, and alert the right owner
• Partner with the full-stack engineer who builds the dashboards, designing the tables and queries behind them and using AI coding tools to move faster while checking the results
• Take over the Apache Flink job that ingests events from Kafka into Iceberg
• Improve performance and cost by right-sizing jobs, fixing skew and small-file problems, and tuning queries and storage
• Join the on-call rotation for Data Lakehouse incidents, review code and designs, and mentor other engineers

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field
• 7+ years of professional data engineering experience building production data pipelines at scale, including diagnosing and improving the performance of data jobs and queries, or equivalent advanced degree plus experience
• Production experience with Apache Spark, including batch and streaming (Structured Streaming) pipelines
• Strong data modeling skills, with experience designing analytics schemas on Apache Iceberg or comparable lakehouse table formats
• Proficiency in Java or Scala, and strong SQL
• Experience building data quality checks and monitoring for production pipelines, including freshness and completeness alerting and reconciliation between source and derived data
• Productive use of AI coding tools in real delivery, with the discipline to validate generated code and queries
• Excellent communication and critical thinking skills in a team environment

Preferred Qualifications

• Production experience with Apache Kafka as a streaming source
• Production experience with Apache Flink, including the Iceberg sink, exactly-once delivery, and stateful jobs on Kubernetes
• Experience with data contracts and schema management as code (for example schema registries or dbt model contracts)
• Experience tuning tables and queries for a distributed SQL engine such as Trino
• Experience with workflow orchestration and Python automation
• Experience building dashboards or data applications that put data in front of users, with attention to visual design
• Experience owning the design of a data platform or pipeline, not just implementing it
• Experience mentoring engineers and leading cost or reliability improvements

At Apple, base pay is one part of our total compensation package and is determined within a range. This provides the opportunity to progress as you grow and develop within a role. The base pay range for this role is between $184,700 and $324,800, and your base pay will depend on your skills, qualifications, experience, and location. Apple employees also have the opportunity to become an Apple shareholder through participation in Apple’s discretionary employee stock programs. Apple employees are eligible for discretionary restricted stock unit awards, and can purchase Apple stock at a discount if voluntarily participating in Apple’s Employee Stock Purchase Plan. You’ll also receive benefits including: Comprehensive medical and dental coverage, retirement benefits, a range of discounted products and free services, and for formal education related to advancing your career at Apple, reimbursement for certain educational expenses — including tuition. Additionally, this role might be eligible for discretionary bonuses or commission payments as well as relocation. Learn more about Apple Benefits Note: Apple benefit, compensation and employee stock programs are subject to eligibility requirements and other terms of the applicable plan or program.

Apple is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. We seek to promote equal opportunity for all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, Veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. Learn more about your EEO rights as an applicant

At Apple, we believe accessibility is a fundamental human right. You’ll find that idea reflected in everything here — in our culture, our benefits and our digital tools. By welcoming as many perspectives as possible, we help you build a career where you feel like you belong. Learn about accessibility in Apple’s workplace Learn about reasonable accommodations for job applicants

Apple accepts applications to this posting on an ongoing basis.