Staff Backend Engineer, Data Streaming

Unchain Data; Mission (KS); Remote; USD 130,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Market-leading salary

Meaningful equity

Generous vacation

Wellness budgets

Support for learning and travel

Job summary

Unchain Data is seeking a Staff Engineer to own and evolve our streaming infrastructure. This role involves defining technical direction and addressing complex problems within a fast-moving team.

With 8+ years of backend engineering experience, proficiency in Rust, and hands-on knowledge of streaming systems, you'll drive architectural decisions and elevate team performance while ensuring reliability and operational excellence.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of backend engineering experience with a strong track record building large-scale, production systems.
• Deep proficiency in Rust or an equivalent systems programming language.
• Hands-on experience with streaming systems such as Kafka, NATS, Flink, or Kinesis.
• Proficiency operating databases in production environments (Postgres, ClickHouse, RocksDB, or similar).
• Strong operational mindset with proven reliability in production systems.

Responsibilities

• Architect and lead development of high-throughput, low-latency streaming systems.
• Drive technical roadmap for streaming including new capabilities.
• Lead system design discussions and architectural decisions across the stack.
• Set standards for operational excellence — reliability and observability.
• Mentor and elevate engineers on the team.

Skills

Backend engineering experience

Rust or equivalent systems programming

Streaming systems (Kafka, NATS, Flink, Kinesis)

Database operations in production

System design and architecture

Excellent communication skills

Problem-solving skills

Job description

About Us

Helius is building the core infrastructure for Solana - empowering developers to create the next generation of crypto-powered applications. Our mission is to accelerate the development of internet capital markets by making it easier, faster, and more intuitive to build on-chain.

Thousands of teams - from early-stage startups to industry leaders like Coinbase, Phantom, and Jupiter - rely on Helius APIs, webhooks, and indexing tools to power their products. Backed by Haun Ventures, Founders Fund, and Foundation Capital, we're a small, senior team obsessed with performance, simplicity, and scalability in decentralized systems.

The Role

We're looking for a Staff Engineer to own and evolve our streaming infrastructure and products. This isn't a role where you execute someone else's roadmap — you'll define technical direction, drive architectural decisions, and solve the hardest problems on one of Helius's most critical and fastest-growing products. You'll work closely with engineers and founders to shape what we build and how we build it.

About the Team

The Data Streaming team builds and operates products like Laserstream that deliver real-time Solana state changes to thousands of developers and institutions around the world. Latency, reliability, and throughput aren't just engineering concerns here, they're the product. The team moves fast, owns a large surface area, and sits in the critical path of the company's growth.

Responsibilities

• Architect and lead development of high-throughput, low-latency streaming systems that power our core products
• Drive the technical roadmap for streaming — including filtered streams, next-generation webhooks, and new capabilities that expand what developers can build on Solana
• Lead system design discussions and make architectural decisions across the stack: software, hardware, and networking
• Set standards for operational excellence — reliability, incident response, and system observability
• Mentor and elevate engineers on the team, and drive technical consensus across engineering, product, and leadership
• Partner cross-functionally with Sales, Support, and adjacent infrastructure teams to ensure streaming products meet the needs of customers at scale
• Identify and solve complex, ambiguous problems that span multiple systems

Requirements

• 8+ years of backend engineering experience with a strong track record building large-scale, production systems
• Deep proficiency in Rust or an equivalent systems programming language
• Performance-oriented engineering instincts — you think across the full stack: software, Linux internals, networking, and hardware
• Hands-on experience with streaming systems such as Kafka, NATS, Flink, or Kinesis
• Proficiency operating databases in production environments (Postgres, ClickHouse, RocksDB, or similar)
• Strong operational mindset — you've owned production systems with real customers and know what it takes to keep them running reliably
• Excellent communication and writing skills; you can drive technical consensus and influence without authority
• High ownership and urgency — you thrive in fast-moving environments and hold yourself to an exceptional standard

Why Helius?

• High-impact work: Your code will power applications used by millions across the Solana ecosystem, including Coinbase, Jupiter, and Phantom.
• Serious engineering: Build fast, reliable systems and user experiences across distributed infra, high-throughput backends, and modern frontend stacks.
• Ownership & growth: Lead critical initiatives, influence architecture and product direction, and take on more responsibility as the company scales.
• Remote-first flexibility: Work where you're most effective with a flexible, fully distributed team.
• Competitive comp & perks: Market-leading salary, meaningful equity, generous vacation, wellness budgets, and support for learning and travel.
• Mission-driven team: Join ambitious builders who move fast, take ownership, and are shaping the future of decentralized apps.