Software Engineer, AI Infrastructure - USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is seeking engineers for its Reliability and Efficiency team in San Jose. The team partners with engineering and product to build and run large-scale, globally distributed, observable, fault-tolerant systems powering TikTok’s state-of-the-art Recommendation and Search engines.

You will deploy, operate, and optimize systems, develop automation scripts, and monitor cloud resources to meet efficiency goals and maintain SLAs across global data centers.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field with 1+ years of professional software development or infrastructure experience.
• Foundational knowledge of distributed systems and troubleshooting complex technical issues.
• Effective communication and proactive approach to solving engineering bottlenecks.
• Experience with agentic frameworks and tools development.

Responsibilities

• Assist in the deployment, operation, and optimization of Recommendation and Search systems throughout their lifecycle.
• Develop and maintain internal software and automation scripts to eliminate manual tasks and improve R&D velocity.
• Support the availability of large-scale services deployed across global data centers through proactive monitoring and maintenance.
• Track and report on cloud resource utilization to help meet efficiency goals and maintain cluster SLAs.
• Configure and manage monitoring stacks to track service latency, health metrics, and system performance.

Skills

Distributed systems awareness

Troubleshooting complex issues

Effective communication

Agentic frameworks & tools development

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related technical field

Tools

Kubernetes

Job description

Responsibilities

About the Team

The USDS JV Reliability and Efficiency team works with engineering and product teams to build and run large-scale, globally distributed, observable, fault‑tolerant systems for TikTok state‑of‑the‑Art Recommendation and Search engines. Engineers on this team will deliver on production ownership and be responsible for observability and automation across complex, large-scale service mesh architectures.

Responsibilities:

• Assist in the deployment, operation, and optimization of Recommendation and Search systems throughout their entire lifecycle.
• Develop and maintain internal software and automation scripts to eliminate manual tasks and improve overall R&D velocity.
• Support the availability of large‑scale services deployed across global data centers through proactive monitoring and maintenance.
• Track and report on cloud resource utilization to help the team meet efficiency goals and maintain cluster SLAs.
• Configure and manage monitoring stacks to track service latency, health metrics, and system performance.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field, with 1+ years of professional experience in software development or infrastructure.
• Foundational knowledge of distributed systems and a strong interest in troubleshooting complex technical issues.
• Effective communication skills and a proactive approach to solving engineering bottlenecks.
• Experience with agentic frameworks and tools development.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Familiarity with container orchestration tools like Kubernetes.
• Basic understanding of the machine learning lifecycle or model inference workflows.

About USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture has been established in compliance with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025. Our foundation is a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program we operate under defined safeguards to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps and the algorithm. We safeguard the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision‑making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation. USDS Joint Venture helps ensure Americans can continue to express their creativity, discover new hobbies and interests, and build thriving communities and businesses on a global scale.

On‑site presence across teams allows the company to operate with greater speed, alignment, and agility — especially in areas like real‑time decision‑making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting from a hybrid work model to a fully in‑person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Why Join Us

Inspiring creativity is at