Senior Software Engineer

Zuora; Foster City (CA); On-site; USD 164,800 - 226,600; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation

Medical, dental, and vision insurance

Flexible time off

Paid parental leave

Learning & Development stipend

Job summary

Zuora in Foster City, CA is seeking an experienced architect to lead the design of mission-critical systems and innovate in real-time data processing.

Your role emphasizes developing high-performance distributed services and integrating AI-assisted tools to solve complex engineering challenges. The position follows a hybrid work model, requiring onsite work three days a week.

Competitive compensation, flexible time off, and extensive benefits including medical, dental, and parental leave are offered.

Qualifications

• Significant experience building and scaling services within large codebases using Modern Java.
• Expert in architecting stream processing pipelines and managing data consistency.
• Proven ability to architect and manage cloud-native backend services.

Responsibilities

• Design and evolve high-performance, distributed services.
• Lead the development of sophisticated stream processing pipelines.
• Utilize advanced tools to navigate complex logic.

Skills

Strong Java Foundations

Real-time Data Processing

Infrastructure & Deployment

AI-Assisted Productivity

Tools

Apache Kafka

AWS

Kubernetes

Modern Java

Spring Framework

Job description

Company Overview

At Zuora, we do Modern Business. We’re helping people subscribe to new ways of doing business that are better for people, companies and ultimately the planet. It’s an approach resulting from the shift to the Subscription Economy that puts customers first by building recurring relationships instead of one-time product sales and focuses on sustainable growth.

Through our leading expertise and multi-product suite - including Zuora Billing and Zuora Revenue — we provide a unified monetization and revenue automation platform that connects quoting, billing, payments, and revenue recognition end to end. Our solutions give finance and revenue teams a single source of truth for subscription economics, streamline ASC 606-compliant revenue recognition, and enable real-time insights into growth, profitability, and customer lifetime value.

We are transforming all industries and working with the world’s most innovative companies to monetize new business models, nurture subscriber relationships and optimize their digital experiences.

The Team & Role

The Beijing Billing Core team is a specialized engineering powerhouse and the heartbeat of Zuora’s global platform. As a mission-critical core team, we architect the foundational systems that power the world’s most sophisticated enterprise businesses. We operate at the intersection of high-scale distributed systems and real-time data innovation, prioritizing long-term engineering excellence and robust, scalable design.

The Opportunity: Leading the Strategic Evolution

We are currently driving a high-stakes evolution from traditional enterprise architecture to an intelligent, event-driven ecosystem.

• Mission-Critical Impact: Your work sits at the center of the global economy, directly enabling the growth of industry-leading organizations.
• The AI-Augmented Frontier: We are pioneering the future of software delivery by embracing an AI-first engineering culture. Our team leverages advanced AI development environments to navigate complex architectural puzzles, allowing our engineers to focus on high-level systems thinking and innovation.
• Global Technical Leadership: This is a rare opportunity to bridge the gap between stable, world-class foundations and greenfield data engineering within a high-talent global hub.

The Mission: Architecting the Future of Billing

Your mission is to ensure our platform remains the definitive global standard for reliability and intelligence. You will solve the industry’s most challenging scale and consistency problems, building a self-healing, high-concurrency engine that defines the future of digital commerce.

Location & Work Arrangements

This role is based in our Foster City, CA office and follows a hybrid work model. Team members are expected to work onsite three days per week to foster collaboration, innovation, and team connectivity.

This is not a fully remote position.

What you’ll do

• Architect Mission-Critical Systems: You will design and evolve high-performance, distributed services within our core Java environment. You will be responsible for the architectural stewardship of systems that process billions of transactions, ensuring they remain scalable, robust, and enterprise-grade.
• Drive Real-Time Data Innovation: You will lead the development of sophisticated stream processing pipelines and event-driven architectures. By bridging the gap between foundational data stores and real-time analytics, you will enable the "Intelligence Layer" that defines the future of our global platform.
• Pioneer AI-Augmented Engineering: You will embrace an AI-first development culture, utilizing advanced tools like Claude Code and Codex to navigate complex logic and solve deep architectural puzzles. You will champion engineering excellence, prioritizing disciplined, maintainable design over temporary workarounds.

What You’ll Achieve: Impact & Outcomes

Instead of a list of tasks, these milestones focus on your growth and impact within the team.

• In your first 3 months: You will develop a thorough understanding of our core engine and streaming pipelines. You will successfully use AI-assisted tools to deliver high-quality features and enhancements within our distributed environment.
• By month 6: You will take ownership of a specific service or functional area. You will implement complex streaming or backend features, ensuring they are performant and integrate seamlessly with our real-time data layer.
• Within your first year: You will contribute to the long-term reliability of our platform by resolving technical bottlenecks. You will collaborate with the team to adopt AI-augmented practices and play a key role in the transition toward a more responsive, event-driven architecture

Your Experience (Must-Haves)

To ensure an inclusive applicant pool, we have limited this to core skills essential for success in this role.

• Strong Java Foundations: Significant experience building and scaling services within large codebases using Modern Java, the Spring Framework, and ORM/Persistence Frameworks; committed to delivering clean, maintainable, and disciplined code.
• Real-time Data Processing & Data Engineering: Expert in architecting stream processing pipelines and managing data consistency in high-concurrency, data-intensive systems; proficient in leveraging Apache Kafka, Apache Flink, Apache Beam, and Change Data Capture (CDC) alongside MySQL, ClickHouse, and Redis to build scalable architectures that support evolving schemas and massive data growth.
• Infrastructure & Deployment: Proven ability to architect and manage cloud-native backend services using AWS and Kubernetes to ensure high availability and system resilience.
• AI-Assisted Productivity: Proficient in utilizing AI-assisted development tools such as Claude, Codex, and Cursor to solve complex engineering puzzles efficiently and increase overall technical leverage.

Nice to Haves

These are not required for application but are areas where you can add immediate value.

• Data & Analytics: Experience with relational database optimization or building real-time data synchronization solutions.
• Cloud Operations: Familiarity with deploying and monitoring services in cloud-native or containerized environments.
• Collaborative Approach: Experience working in a global engineering hub and a desire to participate in technical discussions and learning.

Competitive compensation, variable bonus and performance reward opportunities, and retirement programs

Medical, dental and vision insurance

Generous, flexible time off

Paid holidays, “wellness” days and company wide end of year break

More than 10 weeks fully paid parental leave

Learning & Development stipend

Opportunities to volunteer and give back, including charitable donation match

Free resources and support for your mental wellbeing

Specific benefits offerings may vary by country and can be viewed in more detail during your interview process.

We encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply. Applicants in need of special assistance or accommodation during the interview process or in accessing our website may contact us by sending an email to [e-mail].

Our Commitment to an Inclusive Workplace

Think, be and do you! At Zuora, different perspectives, experiences and contributions matter. Everyone counts. Zuora is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer committed to creating an inclusive environment for all.

Zuora does not discriminate on the basis of, and considers individuals seeking employment with Zuora without regards to, race, religion, color, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, reproductive health decisions, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, genetic information, political views or activity, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.

We encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply. Applicants in need of special assistance or accommodation during the interview process or in accessing our website may contact us by sending an email to [e-mail].

Base Pay Details

The base pay details represent the annualized salary range for the posted position. While we share a comprehensive range, a candidate’s final base salary will fall within these guidelines and will be determined based on multiple factors including but not limited to: qualifications of the candidate, job related knowledge, prior related experience, specific and unique skills, the location of the role, internal equity and internal budget. Base pay is only one element of Zuora’s Total Rewards Package. Additional elements may also include bonus/variable compensation, equity and comprehensive benefits, more details found here.

$164,800 — $226,600 USD