Senior Software Engineer

Planet; United States; Hybrid; USD 65,000 - 81,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Paid time off

Wellness program

Home office reimbursement

Phone & Internet reimbursement

Tuition reimbursement

Equity

Volunteering PTO

Job summary

Planet seeks a senior software engineer to develop and operate scalable imaging data platforms. You’ll work on Go, Python, and Java services, with Kubernetes on major clouds, ensuring strong customer experience and observability.

Join a distributed team across Europe and North America, with a hybrid work model including Ljubljana three days per week. Bring 6+ years of production coding, plus solid CI/CD and collaboration skills.

Qualifications

• 6+ years of software development experience in a production environment.
• Bachelor’s degree in a technical field or equivalent practical experience.
• Strong teamwork and collaboration skills, with clear communication.
• Familiarity with GCP or AWS and containerization technologies.
• Experience with relational databases, document stores, and key-value stores.
• Ability to learn new technologies quickly and navigate ambiguity.

Responsibilities

• Build, deploy and maintain large-scale services and APIs with a focus on customer experience.
• Collaborate with engineers and product managers across cross-functional teams.
• Write high-quality, observable production code and participate in code reviews.
• Maintain CI/CD pipelines and run complex deployments.
• Leverage AI tools within the development lifecycle and maintain quality.
• Grow as a developer while guiding teammates as expertise increases.
• Operate APIs and services with Site Reliability Engineering practices.
• Participate in on-call rotation for external and internal services.

Skills

6+ years exp

Python

Go

Java

Git

CI/CD pipelines

Team collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science / Geosciences / related

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

AWS/GCP

Job description

Welcome to Planet. We believe in using space to help life on Earth.

Planet designs, builds, and operates the largest constellation of imaging satellites in history. This constellation delivers an unprecedented dataset of empirical information via a revolutionary cloud-based platform to authoritative figures in commercial, environmental, and humanitarian sectors. We are both a space company and data company all rolled into one.

Customers and users across the globe use Planet's data to develop new technologies, drive revenue, power research, and solve our world’s toughest obstacles.

As we control every component of hardware design, manufacturing, data processing, and software engineering, our office is a truly inspiring mix of experts from a variety of domains.

We have a people-centric approach toward culture and community and we strive to iterate in a way that puts our team members first and prepares our company for growth. Join Planet and be a part of our mission to change the way people see the world.

Planet is a global company with employees working remotely world wide and joining us from offices in San Francisco, Washington DC, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, and The Netherlands.

About the Role

Planet’s Platform teams build and operate systems that enable customers to access and analyze Planet's daily and high resolution imagery, as well as derived products like Basemaps. We enable customers to browse data catalogs, stream data via tile services, and orchestrate geospatial analysis.

This position is to be a contributing member of our Platform teams, developing and deploying imagery access and analysis capabilities for our customers using a tech stack that includes Go, Python, Java, Postgres and Kubernetes on major cloud platforms like Google Cloud. We emphasize scalable, observable systems leveraging open source technologies and standards when applicable.

The team is distributed throughout Europe and North America and thrives on clear asynchronous communication. Success in this role requires strong collaborative communication skills to build coworker relationships across several time zones as well as the ability to contribute to occasional team on‑sites hosted in Planet’s global offices.

This is a full‑time, hybrid role which will require you to work from our Ljubljana office 3 days per week.

Impact You’ll Own

• Build, deploy and maintain performant, distributed large‑scale services and highly‑available APIs in Go, Java and/or Python with a strong emphasis on customer experience
• Work closely with engineers and product managers across multiple cross‑functional teams to align product & engineering goals and objectives
• Write high-quality, maintainable, observable, and well‑documented production code
• Participate in code reviews to maintain high code quality and standards
• Use AI tooling throughout the development lifecycle and holding AI‑assisted work to the same bar as anything you'd write by hand
• Learn and grow as a developer while making a positive impact on our products and customers; bringing the team along with you as your expertise grows
• Own the operation of these APIs and services by embracing Site Reliability Engineering culture, measuring performance, load testing, creating and fine‑tuning alerts, dashboards, runbooks, and responding to incidents
• Participate in rapid response on‑call rotation in support of the team’s external and internal services

What You Bring

• 6+ years of experience in software development within a production environment working preferably with Python, Java and/or Go
• Bachelor’s degree in a technical field such as Computer Science, Geosciences, or a related discipline, or equivalent practical experience
• Solid understanding of software engineering best practices and development methodologies
• Excellent teamwork and collaboration skills – written and verbal; you are comfortable writing an engineering design proposal and soliciting feedback to drive collaborative decisions
• Familiarity with GCP or AWS
• Ability to learn new technologies quickly and independently, navigate uncertain and sometimes ambiguous problem spaces, and take calculated risks
• Experience working with diverse data storage systems such as relational databases, document stores, and key‑value stores
• Excellent problem‑solving, analytical, and communication skills
• Experience with Git, large codebases, reviewing merge requests, and running complex CI/CD pipelines
• Comfortable working with Docker containers
• Solid intuition of when AI is useful in software development and when it is not
• Experience deploying to Kubernetes

What Makes You Stand Out

• Familiarity with geospatial concepts and standards; you’ve worked with GeoTIFFs, GeoJSON, and STAC
• Familiarity with remotely sensed products and associated metadata; you know why someone wants an ortho‑rectified product
• Worked with observability platforms such as Grafana

Application Deadline

11:45p / 23:45 CET on the date stated below. Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis. This posting may be removed earlier than projected if a suitable pool of applications has been received. For this reason, we recommend applying as soon as you are able to.

Benefits While Working at Planet

These offerings are dependent on employment type and geographical location, based upon applicable law or company policy.

• Paid time off including vacation, holidays and company‑wide days off
• Employee Wellness Program
• Home Office Reimbursement
• Monthly Phone and Internet Reimbursement
• Tuition Reimbursement and access to LinkedIn Learning
• Equity
• Volunteering Paid Time Off

Compensation

The expected starting gross salary range for this role is listed below. Individual placement within this range is determined objectively based on gender‑neutral criteria such as your skills, qualifications, and professional experience. This position may also be eligible for discretionary bonuses and/or equity.

Slovenia Salary Range

€57.700 — €72.100 EUR

San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

EEO statement

Planet is committed to building a community where everyone belongs and we invite people from all backgrounds to apply. Planet is an equal opportunity employer, and committed to providing employment opportunities regardless of race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding, age, sexual orientation, military or veteran status, or any other protected classification, in accordance with applicable federal, state, and local laws. Know Your Rights.

Accommodations

Planet is an inclusive community and we know that everyone has their own needs. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation during the hiring process, please reach out to [e-mail] or contact your recruiter with your request. Your message will be confidential and we will be happy to assist you.

AI in Our Interviewing Process

Planet is committed to providing an exceptional interview experience for all candidates. We currently use Metaview to better focus on candidates and less on trying to capture notes. As such, with the candidate's consent, select interviews may be recorded and include a Planet AI Notetaker for transcription and summarization purposes. Should an interview involve use of AI interview technologies, the candidate will receive notification and have the ability to opt out both in advance and/or real-time. Opting out will not affect one's candidacy.

Candidate AI Policy

Planet embraces Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools, and we encourage its responsible use. We understand that candidates may use various resources, including AI tools, to prepare for interviews and assessments. However, during any live interview stage or when actively completing assessments for this position, the use of AI tools—e.g. Large Language Models (LLMs), deep fake technology, etc.—is strictly prohibited unless explicitly prompted by an interviewer or assessment instructions. If you are unsure about acceptable use, please contact your recruiter for clarification. If an AI tool or similar technology is desired as an accommodation, please contact [e-mail] with your request for assistance. Your message will be confidential, and we will be happy to assist you. Violation of this policy may result in disqualification of your application.