Software Engineer, Infrastructure

Socket.dev; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 160,000 - 200,000; Full time

Job summary

Sift, a data infrastructure platform for hardware engineering teams, seeks an experienced Platform Engineer to design and operate scalable cloud and on‑prem infrastructure. You will help optimize performance, reliability, and cost while collaborating across product and engineering functions.

In this early-stage startup, you’ll own critical infrastructure initiatives, implement robust monitoring, and drive automation across deployment pipelines using Docker, Kubernetes, and Terraform/CDK.

Qualifications

• 3+ years distributed systems experience focusing on designing and managing cloud-based environments.
• Hands-on experience with containerization technologies (Docker, Kubernetes) and container orchestration platforms.
• Passion for building and operating developer productivity tools, frameworks, and other aspects of platform engineering.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and version control systems.
• Knowledge of automated testing best practices and frameworks in distributed systems.
• You are pragmatic, solution-oriented and prefer collaboration across functions.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and maintain scalable, resilient infrastructure solutions to support our growing platform and customer base.
• Collaborate with software engineers to optimize application performance and reliability.
• Implement monitoring, alerting, and logging systems to ensure proactive identification and resolution of issues.
• Automate deployment processes and streamline infrastructure management using modern DevOps tools and methodologies.
• Evolve our backend architecture/infrastructure for both cloud and on-premise deployments.
• Work with the team to set and prioritize our roadmap to maximize customer impact.
• Lead initiatives to improve infrastructure reliability, performance, and cost efficiency.

Skills

Distributed systems

Cloud platforms

Containerization

CI/CD

Go/Java/React/TypeScript

Terraform/CDK

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

Terraform/CDK

Job description

About Sift

Sift is the data infrastructure platform for hardware engineering teams. Sift turns high-frequency telemetry into engineering insights for mission-critical systems. Teams use Sift to build and operate rockets, satellites, autonomous vehicles, energy systems, defense platforms, and more.Founded by former SpaceX engineers who built the tools behind Dragon and Starlink, Sift is building the data infrastructure to herald the AI era for physical systems.

In This Role, You'll:

• Design, build, and maintain scalable, resilient infrastructure solutions to support our growing platform and customer base.

• Collaborate with software engineers to optimize application performance and reliability.

• Implement monitoring, alerting, and logging systems to ensure proactive identification and resolution of issues.

• Automate deployment processes and streamline infrastructure management using modern DevOps tools and methodologies.

• Evolve our backend architecture/infrastructure for both cloud and on-premise deployments.

• Work with the team to set and prioritize our roadmap to maximize customer impact.

• Lead initiatives to improve infrastructure reliability, performance, and cost efficiency.

The Skillset You'll Bring:

• 3+ years of relevant distributed systems experience focusing on designing and managing cloud-based environments (e.g., AWS, Azure, GCP).

• Hands-on experience with containerization technologies (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes) and container orchestration platforms.

• Passion for building and operating developer productivity tools, frameworks, and other aspects of platform engineering.

• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and version control systems.

• Knowledge of automated testing best practices and frameworks, ensuring software reliability through integration, performance, and end-to-end testing in distributed systems.

• You're excited by the ambiguity and high-ownership culture of early-stage startups.

• You are pragmatic, solution-oriented, and scrappy.

• You enjoy working collaboratively with a broad range of job functions and roles.

• Experience with our tech stack: Go, Java, React, TypeScript, Kafka/Redpanda, Flink, AWS, Azure, GCP, Docker, Kubernetes, and Terraform/CDK

  • Or equivalent distributed systems

• Good knowledge of cloud, on-prem, networking, and service architecture in multi-region multi-cloud setups.

Engineering At SIFT:

You'll have the opportunity to help evolve and scale our platform because we're still in the early stages of building the product. Relevant technologies include:

• Web frontend & backend: ECharts, Go, gRPC, PostgreSQL, Protobuf, Radix, React, Redux, and TypeScript

• Data: Arrow, DataFusion, Flink, Parquet, and Rust

• Infrastructure: Argo CD, AWS, Docker, GitHub Actions, Grafana, Kubernetes, Kustomize, Linux, Prometheus, and Terragrunt

Location:

Sift’s headquarters is in Marina Del Rey, CA (Next to LAX). We collaborate in person twice a week—on Mondays and Thursdays—and come together for a full week every two months. We are open to relocating candidates to LA or working from our San Francisco office for the right candidate.

Salary range: $160,000 - $200,000 per year. Plus equity and benefits.

Eligibility:

U.S. Citizenship Required: This position requires U.S. citizenship due to the nature of certain customer environments, security requirements, and access obligations associated with the role.