Software Engineer - ML Infrastructure

Arena Intelligence, Inc.; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 230,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation & equity

Health benefits

Cutting-edge AI work

Culture of transparency

Job summary

Arena Intelligence in San Francisco seeks a Member of Technical Staff - ML Infrastructure software engineer to design and build scalable, real-time data and API infrastructure that powers researchers and developers. You will architect low-latency pipelines, ensure reliability, and mentor engineers, collaborating with AI researchers and product teams to meet evolving needs.

This role offers the chance to work on cutting-edge AI with a mission-driven team and a culture of excellence, energy, and

Qualifications

• 5+ years of software engineering experience in infrastructure or large-scale ML systems.
• Deep expertise in distributed systems, stream processing, and scalable backend architecture.
• Proven ability to design and operate low-latency, high-throughput, fault-tolerant systems.
• Strong foundation in systems design, performance tuning, and building reliable services.
• Comfortable in a dynamic, high-ownership, fast-growth environment.
• Prior experience with PyTorch model development is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Architect and scale high-performance, real-time API and data systems.
• Design and implement low-latency pipelines to process and analyze large-scale event streams.
• Ensure reliability through robust data integrity, availability, and consistency mechanisms.
• Mentor and guide engineers on infrastructure best practices, architecture, and performance tuning.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with AI researchers, product leaders, and engineers to anticipate evolving infrastructure needs and deliver resilient, extensible systems.

Skills

Distributed systems

Stream processing

Backend architecture

Low-latency systems

Performance tuning

Mentoring engineers

PyTorch (optional)

Tools

PyTorch

Job description

About Arena Intelligence

Arena is the platform for evaluating how AI models perform in the real world. Founded by researchers from UC Berkeley's SkyLab, we're on a mission to measure and advance the frontier of AI for real-world use, and to build the foundation for everyone to understand, shape, and benefit from it.

Tens of millions of people use Arena each month to evaluate how frontier systems handle the work they actually do. The preferences they share power the most transparent, rigorous, and human-centered evaluations in AI. Leading AI labs, enterprises, and independent researchers rely on our work and open datasets to understand how models behave in real workflows: agentic coding, creative generation, professional productivity, and beyond. We go beyond leaderboards and decompose what human experience reveals about AI, so models advance toward the work people actually do.

We're a team of researchers, academics, builders, and creatives from UC Berkeley, Google, Stanford, and DeepMind. We seek truth, move fast, and value craftsmanship, curiosity, and impact over hierarchy. We're building a company where thoughtful, curious people from all backgrounds can do their best work together, in an office culture that radiates excellence, energy, and focus.

About the Role

Arena Intelligence is seeking a Member of Technical Staff - ML Infrastructure software engineer to lead the design and development of scalable, high-performance real-time data and API infrastructure. In this role, you’ll architect systems that capture and process large volumes of serving requests in real time, powering the insights that help researchers and developers build the world’s most advanced AI and its applications. Your work will be foundational to how we surface trustworthy, transparent, and timely evaluation signals across the platform. This role is ideal for someone who thrives in fast-moving environments, cares deeply about performance and reliability, and wants to build systems that help the AI community better understand what models are the best for their real-world use cases.

You’ll

• Architect and scale high-performance, real-time API and data systems

• Design and implement low-latency pipelines to process and analyze large-scale event streams

• Ensure reliability through robust data integrity, availability, and consistency mechanisms

• Mentor and guide engineers on infrastructure best practices, architecture, and performance tuning

• Collaborate cross-functionally with AI researchers, product leaders, and engineers to anticipate evolving infrastructure needs and deliver resilient, extensible systems

You’ll have

• 5+ years of experience in software engineering, with a focus on infrastructure or large-scale data and ML systems

• Deep expertise in distributed systems, stream processing, and scalable backend architecture

• Proven ability to design and operate low-latency, high-throughput, and fault-tolerant systems

• Strong foundation in systems design, performance tuning, and building reliable, fault-tolerant services

• Comfortable in a dynamic, high-ownership, fast-growth environment

• Prior experience with PyTorch model development is a plus.

What we offer

• We offer competitive compensation and equity aligned to the markets where our team members are based. The base salary range will depend on the candidate’s permanent work location.

• Comprehensive health and wellness benefits, including medical, dental, vision, and additional support programs.

• The opportunity to work on cutting-edge AI with a small, mission-driven team

• A culture that values transparency, trust, and community impact

Come help build the space where anyone can explore and help shape the future of AI.

Arena Intelligence provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, genetics, sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. We are committed to a diverse and inclusive workforce and welcome people from all backgrounds, experiences, perspectives, and abilities.