Software Engineer, AI Infrastructure - USDS

TikTok USDS Joint Venture; Seattle (WA); On-site; USD 129,960 - 246,240; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, and vision insurance

401(k) savings plan with company match

Paid parental leave

Paid holidays and sick days

Wellbeing benefits

Job summary

TikTok USDS Joint Venture is looking for an SRE to manage and optimize large-scale systems for Recommendation and Search engines. The role involves deploying systems, developing automation scripts, and ensuring service availability across global data centers.

Candidates should have a Bachelor's degree, experience in software development, and proficiency in Linux, Python, and Docker. Excellent communication skills and an interest in troubleshooting complex issues are essential for this position.

Qualifications

• 1+ years of professional experience in software development or infrastructure.
• Solid understanding of networking fundamentals.
• Experience with monitoring tools and automation scripts.

Responsibilities

• Deploy and optimize Recommendation and Search systems.
• Develop internal software for automation and efficiency.
• Monitor and maintain service availability globally.

Skills

Linux systems

Python programming

Go programming

Docker

CI/CD pipelines

distributed systems

troubleshooting

effective communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Kubernetes

Job description

About the Team The USDS JV AI Infra SRE 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. SREs 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.
• Solid understanding of Linux systems and networking fundamentals.
• Proficiency in programming with Python or Go, with a focus on writing clean and efficient automation tools.
• Experience working with Docker and basic CI/CD pipelines (e.g., Jenkins, GitLab CI, or GitHub Actions).
• 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:

• Prior experience or internships focused on SRE, DevOps, or internal platform engineering.
• Familiarity with container orchestration tools like Kubernetes.
• Basic understanding of the machine learning lifecycle or model inference workflows.

Job Information

【For Pay Transparency】Compensation Description (Annually) The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $129,960 - $246,240 annually. Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate’s qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units. Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure). The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.

USDS Reasonable Accommodation

USDS is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at https://tinyurl.com/USDS-RA

Los Angeles County

For Los Angeles County (unincorporated) Candidates: Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment: 1. Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues; 2. Appropriately handling and managing confidential information including proprietary and trade secret information and access to information technology systems; and 3. Exercising sound judgment.