Staff Software Engineer, Hercules Database (Rust)

Hercules; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 100,000 - 300,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Unlimited AI token budget

Take what you need vacation policy

Healthcare, vision, and dental

Daily lunches, dinners and snacks in 


We guarantee you will do the best work

Job summary

Hercules in San Francisco seeks a staff level platform engineer to help build the infrastructure stack for AI software development. You will lead the backend-as-a-service, shaping data models, APIs, and scalable services that power customer applications.

Our stack includes Postgres, Redis, Clickhouse, Docker, Terraform, and TypeScript, and we value clean code, strong systems design, and a bias for action. In-office with optional remote for exceptional candidates in US time zones.

Qualifications

• Strong fundamentals in system design, architecture, data modeling, and API design.
• Write clean, maintainable code and work well in monorepos.
• Proficient in Rust and building production-grade systems.
• Deep understanding of data systems: indexing, transactions, consistency.
• Experience with distributed, multi-tenant infrastructures.
• Focus on latency, throughput, and resource efficiency.
• Experience with AI-enabled coding workflows is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead the Hercules backend-as-a-service.
• Design scalable backend components and data models for the platform.
• Develop and refine APIs and SDKs for AI agents to build on the platform.
• Ensure hosting and infrastructure provide strong tenant isolation, observability, and resilience.
• Collaborate with frontend and inference teams to deliver reliable software.

Skills

Software fundamentals

Code quality

Rust

Data systems

Infrastructure

Performance

AI workflows

Tools

Postgres

Redis

Clickhouse

Terraform

CDK

Docker

Job description

What are we looking for?

Hercules is looking for a staff level platform engineer to help us build the future infrastructure stack for AI software development

What will you do?

You will lead the Hercules backend-as-a-service

• Hercules Database: An enterprise-grade data platform with flexible schemas and fine-grained access controls. Similar to force.com (powering Salesforce)

• Backend Services: A fast, scalable backend-as-a-service deeply tied to the Hercules Database

• APIs & SDKs: Design the interfaces AI agents use to build on the platform

• Performance & Scale: Engineer for low latency, high throughput, and efficient resource use

• Hosting & Infrastructure: Build and operate the infrastructure that runs customer applications reliably, with strong tenant isolation, observability, and failure resilience

What skills do we expect you to have?

We expect candidates to be incredibly strong across all of the following areas:

• Software fundamentals: system design, architecture, data modeling, and API design

• Code and codebase quality: write clean, maintainable code. Work effectively in monorepos

• Rust: build efficient, reliable production systems

• Data systems: indexing, query performance, transactions, and consistency, etc

• Infrastructure: scale large, data-intensive, multi-tenant, distributed services

• Performance: optimize latency, throughput, and resource efficiency

• AI: able to truly 10x your workflow by being on the frontier of AI coding

What’s Hercules’ stack?

• Technologies: Typescript, React, AI SDK, Postgres, Redis, Clickhouse, Tailwind, IaC (CDK, Terraform), Docker, Otel, Hono, Drizzle ORM, Temporal

• Clouds: Cloudflare, AWS

• AI Models: OpenAI, Anthropic, Google

What are Hercules’ operating principles?

Hercules’ operating principles guide how we make decisions every day. We take them very seriously. Most of the principles can be learned on the job, however, we do specifically filter for the following principles in our hiring process:

1. We ship. We ship fast, iterate, and correct mistakes quickly. Our bias for action speeds up our learning and delights our customers.

2. We strive for excellence. Doing things well is in our DNA. We have good taste. We get the details right. Our outputs are exceptionally simple and self-serve. We’re proud of our work.

3. We are hungry. We are willing to work hard and break through walls to achieve the outcomes we want. We are willing to operate at any level to get things done.

Is Hercules in-office or remote?

Hercules founding team works in-office in San Francisco (Kearny and Bush). We have a very strong preference for in office. We are open to remote for exceptional candidates who are willing to 1) work in US time zones and 2) travel to the office regularly.

What are Hercules’ benefits?

• Unlimited AI token budget

• Take what you need vacation policy

• Healthcare, vision, and dental

• Daily lunches, dinners and snacks in the office

• We guarantee you will do the best work of your career here

What’s the compensation?

$100k-$300k + equity (variable based on seniority, equity, and location)