Software Development Engineer

Vosper Thornycroft Group; Herndon (VA); Hybrid; USD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Job summary

Vosper Thornycroft Group is seeking an experienced Software Development Engineer to design, develop, and enhance scalable event-driven software systems for complex data pipelines in a security-conscious environment.

The role emphasizes building modular architectures, real-time alerting, and observability across multiple data domains using Python, Kafka, Grafana, and the ELK stack.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience in a technical field.
• Strong Python development experience and knowledge of asynchronous programming.
• Experience with distributed messaging (Kafka) and event-driven architectures.
• Experience designing observable, fault-tolerant systems and dashboards.

Responsibilities

• Design and develop scalable event-driven architectures for high-volume data pipelines.
• Develop backend services in Python with asynchronous and concurrent programming.
• Implement distributed messaging solutions using Kafka.
• Build modular architectures to accommodate new data formats and domains.
• Develop frameworks for granular event tracking and observability across pipelines.
• Create dashboards and monitoring with Grafana and ELK Stack for health visibility.
• Collaborate with data teams to extend architectures to new data domains and formats.

Skills

Python

Async programming

Distributed systems

Kafka

JSON

Grafana

ELK Stack

Observability

Data pipelines

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Kafka

Grafana

Elasticsearch

Logstash

Kibana

Job description

Overview

VTG is seeking an experienced Software Development Engineer to design, develop, and enhance scalable event-driven and distributed software systems supporting complex data pipelines. This role will focus on building modular architectures that provide comprehensive event tracking, observability, fault tolerance, access control, and real-time alerting across multiple data domains.

What will you do?

• Design and develop scalable event-driven architectures supporting high-volume data pipelines and distributed systems.
• Develop backend services and applications using Python, including asynchronous and concurrent programming techniques.
• Design and implement distributed messaging and event-processing solutions using Kafka.
• Build modular software architectures that can easily integrate new data formats, sources, and domains.
• Develop frameworks that provide granular tracking and monitoring of events throughout data pipelines.
• Design and implement fault-tolerant systems that maintain reliability and availability across distributed environments.
• Implement access control and access management capabilities within event-driven architectures.
• Develop solutions for real-time alerting, event tracking, and digital record keeping.
• Implement observability capabilities using Grafana and the ELK Stack.
• Build dashboards and monitoring solutions that provide visibility into application and system health.
• Develop and maintain interfaces utilizing JSON for structured data interchange.
• Troubleshoot distributed application and data-pipeline issues and identify opportunities to improve performance and reliability.
• Apply modular software design principles to improve system maintainability, scalability, and extensibility.
• Collaborate with engineering and data teams to expand architectures to support additional data domains and formats.

Do you have what it takes?

• Active TS/SCI W/ Polygraph required.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Finance, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Strong software development experience with Python.
• Experience with asynchronous programming and concurrency in Python.
• Hands-on experience with Apache Kafka or similar distributed messaging technologies.
• Strong understanding of distributed systems.
• Experience designing and developing event-driven architectures.
• Experience working with JSON and structured data.
• Understanding of fault-tolerant architecture and resilient system design.
• Experience implementing observability and monitoring solutions.
• Hands-on experience with Grafana.
• Experience with the ELK Stack (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana).
• Experience developing scalable applications or data-processing pipelines.