Staff Backend Engineer, Licensing

Horizon3; United States; Hybrid; USD 230,000 - 270,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Inclusive team

Growth opportunities

Innovative culture

Hybrid & Remote Work

Competitive compensation

Job summary

Horizon3.ai is seeking a Staff Backend Engineer to lead services that manage NodeZero packaging, customer entitlements, and usage enforcement. You will influence cross-team architecture, ensure correct data handling, and maintain production quality while collaborating with Product and Engineering to deliver scalable solutions.

You will mentor engineers, own complex production problems, and drive improvements that reduce operational burden.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in CS/CE or related field.
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience.
• Track record of leading architecture or technical direction for complex systems.
• Strong experience with SQL, data modeling, distributed systems, and service reliability.
• Experience influencing technical decisions across teams and mentoring other engineers.
• Excellent judgment balancing correctness, scalability, maintainability and delivery speed.

Responsibilities

• Set technical direction for customer-facing backend services and APIs.
• Design robust data models and workflows for licensing and entitlements.
• Lead cross-service initiatives with hands-on implementation.
• Establish patterns for data correctness, migrations, API evolution, and observability.
• Collaborate with Product and engineering teams on requirements and tradeoffs.
• Mentor engineers through reviews, pairing, and technical writing.

Skills

Backend systems

APIs

SQL & data modeling

Distributed systems

Cloud & containers

Go/Python/Java/TypeScript

Mentoring engineers

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

GraphQL

AWS

Kafka

Temporal/Prefect

Job description

Get to Know Us

Horizon3 is a fast-growing, remote cybersecurity company dedicated to the mission of enabling organizations to proactively find, fix and verify exploitable attack vectors before criminals exploit them. Our flagship product, the NodeZeroTM platform, delivers production-safe autonomous pentests and other key assessment operations that scale across the largest internal, external, cloud, and hybrid cloud environments. NodeZero has been adopted by organizations of all sizes, from small educational institutions to government agencies and Global 100 enterprises. It is used by IT Ops/SecOps teams, consulting pentesters, and MSSPs and MSPs.

We are a fusion of former U.S. Special Operations cyber operators, startup engineers & operators, and formerly frustrated cybersecurity practitioners. We're committed to helping solve our common security problems: ineffective security tools and false positives, resulting in alert fatigue, blind spots, checkbox security culture, cybersecurity skills shortage, and the long lead time and expense of hiring outside consultants. Collectively, we are a team of learn it alls, committed to a culture of respect, collaboration, ownership, and results.

What You’ll Do

As a Staff Backend Engineer on the Licensing, Usage & Entitlements team, you’ll provide hands-on technical leadership for the services that manage NodeZero packaging, customer entitlements, and usage enforcement. You’ll shape how these business-critical capabilities scale across direct and partner accounts, and help ensure that the right products, capabilities, and limits are represented consistently. You’ll lead complex initiatives that cross service boundaries and customer-account models, setting patterns for data correctness, safe evolution, and production support. You’ll partner across Product and Engineering while remaining deeply involved in implementation and operational outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Set technical direction for services that represent customer purchases, packaging, enabled capabilities, entitlements, and usage limits.
• Design robust models and workflows that apply licensing and access rules consistently across direct and MSP/MSPP accounts.
• Lead complex initiatives across services and customer-account models, remaining hands-on in implementation.
• Establish patterns for data correctness, safe migrations, API evolution, observability, and production support.
• Partner with Product and other engineering teams on requirements, integration points, and tradeoffs affecting customer access and usage.
• Mentor engineers and influence technical decisions through design reviews, code reviews, pairing, and clear technical writing.
• Own resolution of difficult production problems and drive improvements that reduce recurrence and operational burden.

What You’ll Bring

• Ability to set technical direction for complex, business-critical systems and align partners around clear tradeoffs.
• Strong judgment balancing data correctness, scalability, maintainability, customer impact, and delivery speed.
• Excellent communication and collaboration across engineering and Product, including clear written design rationale.
• A mentoring mindset and commitment to raising engineering quality across teams.
• A high degree of ownership for systems in production, from architecture through incident follow-through.
  

Required Education / Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience, with substantial experience in backend services and APIs.
• Track record of leading architecture or technical direction for complex, production-critical systems.
• Strong experience with SQL, data modeling, distributed systems, and service reliability.
• Experience influencing technical decisions across teams and mentoring other engineers.
• Excellent judgment in balancing correctness, scalability, maintainability, and delivery speed.

Required Tech Stack Experience

• Deep experience building and operating backend services in a modern language such as Python, Go, Java, or TypeScript.
• Strong SQL and relational data modeling experience, along with API and service design for production systems.
• Experience building cloud-hosted services and operating containerized applications such as Docker; familiarity with Kubernetes or a comparable orchestrator.
• Experience with every example technology is not required; depth in relevant areas and the ability to make sound technical choices are important.

What Sets You Apart?

• Experience with licensing, entitlements, subscriptions, usage metering, billing-adjacent workflows, or feature access controls.
• Experience with multi-tenant SaaS, account hierarchies, RBAC, or partner account models.
• Experience with Python or Go, PostgreSQL, GraphQL, AWS, and event-driven or distributed systems.
• Familiarity with Kafka or other event-streaming systems, workflow tools such as Temporal or Prefect, and production observability platforms.

Travel Required

We are a fully remote company, and this job may require up to 5% of travel to be successful.

Compensation and Values

At Horizon3, we believe that our people are our greatest asset, and our compensation philosophy reflects this core value. We are committed to fostering an environment where all employees feel valued, respected, and rewarded for their contributions. Our compensation structure is designed to be fair, competitive, and transparent, ensuring that every team member is recognized and compensated equitably across roles, levels, and locations.

In accordance with various State’s transparency regulations, we provide the following salary range information for this position:

• Base salary range $230,000 - $270,000 annually. The exact salary will be determined based on the selected candidate’s location, qualifications, experience, and relevant skills.
• Additional compensation: All full-time roles are eligible for an equity package in the form of stock options.

Perks of Horizon3

• Inclusive Team: We value diversity and promote an inclusive culture where everyone can thrive.
• Growth Opportunities: Be part of a dynamic and growing team with numerous career development opportunities.
• Innovative Culture: Work in a collaborative environment that encourages creativity and out-of-the-box thinking.
• Hybrid & Remote Work: We embrace a mix of remote and hybrid work models depending on role and location, including our Chicago office, where some roles require regular in-office presence.
• Competitive Compensation: We offer competitive salary, equity and benefits. Our benefits include health, vision & dental insurance for you and your family, a flexible vacation policy, and generous parental leave.

You Belong Here

Horizon3 is not just an equal opportunity employer - we are a community that values diversity, equity, and inclusion as fundamental principles of our culture and success. We are dedicated to fostering a workplace where everyone feels welcome and respected, regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, hair length or any other legally protected status by law.

Our commitment to diversity and inclusion means we strive to attract, develop, and retain a workforce that reflects the varied communities we serve. We believe that diverse perspectives drive innovation and strengthen our ability to create cutting-edge cybersecurity solutions. At Horizon3, every team member is valued and supported in an environment that encourages personal and professional growth.

We welcome candidates from all backgrounds and experiences, and we encourage all qualified individuals to apply. Come be a part of Horizon3, where your unique contributions are recognized, and your potential is limitless.

Other Duties

Please note this job description is not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee. Duties, responsibilities, and activities may change at any time with or without notice.

Application Note

In any materials you submit, you may redact or remove age-identifying information such as age, date of birth, or dates of school attendance or graduation. You will not be penalized for redacting or removing this information.