Staff Backend Engineer — Platform Core

Archer; San Jose (CA); Hybrid; USD 133,000 - 200,000; Full time

Job summary

Archer is an aerospace company in San Jose developing an all-electric VTOL aircraft for four passengers with low noise and sustainable mobility. We are building a foundational data platform and connector framework powered by Go services in a hybrid San Jose environment.

The Staff Backend Engineer will design canonical data mappings, ensure reliable, replayable ingestion, and optimize high-volume synchronization.

Qualifications

• 6+ years of backend engineering experience in production systems.
• Proficiency with Go and strong typing.
• Deep PostgreSQL knowledge: schema design, indexing, performance.
• Experience designing and operating distributed systems.
• Experience implementing idempotent systems, dead-letter queues and backpressure management.
• Experience with delta/incremental syncs and watermark tracking.
• Cloud-native deployment in AWS or similar environments.

Responsibilities

• Build the reusable plumbing for connectors with authentication, circuit breaking, retries and idempotency.
• Map multi-source enterprise data into strongly-typed entities with provenance.
• Ensure reliable synchronization with watermark-based recovery and no data loss or duplication.
• Implement replay infrastructure to re-process data from local storage when mappings evolve.
• Optimize high-volume synchronization with PostgreSQL, concurrency and batch upserts.
• Define and monitor metrics for throughput, data drift and errors.
• Collaborate with platform architect on schema evolution and contracts.

Skills

Go

PostgreSQL

Distributed systems

Data integrity

Delta syncs

Cloud Native

Backend engineering

AWS

Tools

AWS

Job description

Archer is an aerospace company based in San Jose, California building an all-electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft with a mission to advance the benefits of sustainable air mobility. We are designing, manufacturing, and operating an all-electric aircraft that can carry four passengers while producing minimal noise.

Our sights are set high and our problems are hard, and we believe that diversity in the workplace is what makes us smarter, drives better insights, and will ultimately lift us all to success. We are dedicated to cultivating an equitable and inclusive environment that embraces our differences, and supports and celebrates all of our team members.

Staff Backend Engineer - Platform Core (Hybrid-San Jose)

Role Overview

This role is responsible for building the connector framework and ingestion services that power a foundational data and services platform that unifies enterprise systems into a canonical model. This is not a low-code integration role. You will write production Go services that handle data reconciliation at scale. Our architecture follows a specific pattern: we fetch and store raw API responses for debugging and replay, then transform them into canonical entities. You are responsible for the "system of record" for how our platform interacts with external source systems.

Responsibilities

• Framework Engineering: Build the reusable plumbing for connectors—including authentication, circuit breaking, retries, and idempotency—so that adding a new data source focuses exclusively on data logic.
• Canonical Mapping: Design the logic to map inconsistent enterprise data (Finance, HR, etc.) into strongly-typed entities. This includes handling multi-source enrichment, unit normalization, and field-level provenance.
• Reliability: Implement synchronization strategies with watermark management to ensure the system recovers gracefully from failures without data loss or duplication.
• Replayability: Build infrastructure to store raw API responses allowing the system to re-process data from local storage when mapping logic evolves, without re-querying source APIs.
• Performance: Optimize for high-volume synchronization, focusing on PostgreSQL performance, concurrent fetching, and batch upserts.
• Observability: Define and monitor metrics for throughput, data drift, and error rates to identify issues before they impact downstream applications.
• Collaboration: Collaborate with platform architect on schema evolution, entity contracts, and the boundary between what connectors own and what the platform layer handles

Qualifications

Required:

• 6+ years in backend engineering: Experience building and operating distributed systems in production.
• Go (or similar): Proficiency with strong typing and concurrency.
• PostgreSQL Expertise: Strong understanding of schema design, indexing strategies, and performance tuning
• Distributed systems: Experience designing and operating distributed systems
• Data Integrity: Experience implementing idempotent systems, dead-letter queues, and backpressure management.
• Delta syncs: Experience designing incremental and delta synchronization mechanisms with watermark tracking and safe recovery from mid-sync failures
• Cloud Native: Experience deploying and managing services in AWS or similar environments.

Preferred:

• Enterprise Integration: Experience building custom integration frameworks or working with complex ERP/HR APIs (SAP, Workday, etc.).
• Systems Architecture: Understanding of when to utilize polling versus event-driven patterns (CDC/Kafka).
• AI-Ready Data: Experience structuring data to be consumed by downstream AI/LLM services.

Please note that this job description is intended to provide a general overview of the position and does not include an exhaustive list of responsibilities and qualifications

At Archer we aim to attract, retain, and motivate talent that possess the skills and leadership necessary to grow our business. We drive a pay-for-performance culture and reward performance that supports the Company's business strategy. For this position we are targeting a base pay between 133,400 - 200,000. Actual compensation offered will be determined by factors such as job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.

Archer is proud to be an Equal Opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusivity in the workplace. All aspects of employment are decided on the basis of merit, qualifications, and business needs. We do not discriminate based upon race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, gender identity or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.

Archer is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to job applicants with physical or mental disabilities, and those with sincerely held religious beliefs. Applicants who may require reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or hiring process should provide their name and contact information to Archer's People Team at [e-mail]. Reasonable accommodations will be determined on a case-by-case basis.

Information collected and processed as part of any job applications you choose to submit is subject to Archer's Candidate Privacy Policy.

Archer is unable to provide work visa sponsorship for this position at the present time.

Archer is proud to be an Equal Opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusivity in the workplace. All aspects of employment are decided on the basis of merit, qualifications, and business needs. We do not discriminate based upon race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, gender identity or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.