Senior Software Engineer - Backend (Media Capture)

Madrona Venture Labs; Seattle (WA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Health insurance

Flexible time away

Job summary

Read AI is seeking a Media Capture Engineer to own live media pipelines and real-time processing that power meeting features. You will work across meeting agents, Zoom/Meet/Teams integrations, and cloud streaming components to deliver low-latency data paths.

You will design, implement, and monitor scalable media systems, collaborate with product and design teams, and translate complex technical issues for non-technical stakeholders. Visa sponsorship is not provided.

Qualifications

• Proven experience building software solutions that perform at scale.
• Breadth across backend, frontend, devops, or data engineering with curiosity.
• Comfort operating autonomously on ambiguous problems.

Responsibilities

• Design and build a low-latency live media pipeline for streaming data.
• Maintain meeting agents that capture Zoom, Meet, and Teams calls.
• Tune FFmpeg/GStreamer pipelines for cost efficiency and quality.
• Collaborate with product, design, and other engineers to deliver data-driven features.

Skills

Backend development

Frontend development

DevOps

Data engineering

Communication

Autonomy

Tools

FFmpeg

GStreamer

WebRTC

Cloud platforms

Job description

The Role:

The Media Capture Team owns the systems that capture and process the audio and video data fueling every downstream Read AI feature. As a Media Capture Engineer, you'll work across our meeting agents, media pipelines, and the live connections we manage with third-party meeting platforms like Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams.

What You'll Do:

Live Media Pipeline

• Help design and build our next-generation live media pipeline, focused on low-latency handling of raw streaming data
• Contribute to features like live transcription and live notes that depend on this pipeline's speed and reliability

Meeting Agent & Platform Health

• Maintain and improve the meeting agents that join and capture Zoom, Meet, and Teams calls
• Debug and resolve edge cases in real-time connections with third-party meeting providers
• Build monitoring and alerting to catch issues before they affect users

Media Processing

• Tune FFmpeg/GStreamer processing pipelines for cost efficiency without sacrificing quality or latency
• Improve how raw audio/video is stored and handed off to downstream data consumers

Cross-functional Collaboration

• Work closely with product managers, designers, and other engineers to bring data-driven insights from concept to reality
• Translate complex technical issues for non-technical stakeholders

What We're Looking For:

• Proven experience building software solutions that perform at scale
• Technical breadth across more than one domain (backend, frontend, devops, or data engineering), with a willingness to dive into whatever needs solving
• Adaptability to learn new technologies and stacks as needed
• A problem-solving mindset driven by curiosity and creativity
• Resilience and self-reliance: comfortable operating with autonomy on ambiguous problems
• Strong communication skills across technical and non-technical audiences
• Note: Read AI does not provide visa sponsorship for this role

Nice to Have

• Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure), especially auto-scaling and resource optimization for large systems
• Proficiency with streaming protocols/standards (e.g., WebRTC, MoQ) and media processing libraries (e.g., FFmpeg, GStreamer)
• In-depth knowledge of HTML/CSS and browser rendering
• Prior experience in a startup or fast-growing environment

Why This Role Matters

Every feature Read AI ships, from meeting summaries to live notes, depends on the data this team captures. As we scale to millions of users and push into lower-latency live features, this role sits at the foundation of that growth. If you're excited by impactful work and eager to stretch your problem-solving abilities, we'd love to hear from you.

Benefits

Senior Software Engineer positions offer a base pay range of $180,000 - $210,000 plus equity and benefits. Please note that the base pay shown is a guideline, and individual total compensation will vary based on factors such as qualifications, skill level, competencies, and work location. We also offer low deductible health plans, as well as flexible time away and family leave programs.

Please note our company does not provide visa support or sponsorship for employees.