Starburst Engineer/SME

Citi; Tampa (FL); On-site; USD 114,000 - 171,000; Full time

Job summary

Citi seeks an Application Development Lead in Tampa, FL, to drive data federation initiatives using Starburst, Trino, and Iceberg. You will own onboarding of data catalogs, define licensing and governance standards, and implement centralized access controls while collaborating with data stewards and engineering teams.

Strong experience in distributed systems, CI/CD, cloud platforms, and API security is required.

Qualifications

• 2+ years hands-on with Starburst Data Federation and Virtualization.
• Deep understanding of Trino architecture and Iceberg.
• 6+ years in application development and distributed systems.

Responsibilities

• Interface between analytical consumers and data owners.
• Lead onboarding of new data catalogs in Starburst with native connectors.
• Set operational guidelines to prevent performance issues on transactional DBs.
• Collaborate on data glossaries, lineage, and data classification tags.
• Implement RBAC and Row-Level Filters in Apache Ranger.
• Define onboarding standards for Hive/Iceberg formats and stats collection.
• Tune pushdown capabilities for federation performance.
• Forecast capacity and optimize cluster throughput with materialization.
• Partner with teams to publish reusable Data Products using Starburst and open formats.
• Integrate data products with catalogs, governance marketplaces, and BI tools.

Skills

Starburst Data Federation

Trino architecture

Apache Ranger RBAC

Hive/Iceberg

SQL & NoSQL databases

RESTful APIs

CI/CD tooling

Cloud platforms (AWS/Azure/GCP)

Kubernetes & Docker

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master's degree

Tools

Jenkins

GitHub Actions

Bitbucket Pipelines

Docker

Kubernetes

Spark

Hadoop

Kafka

Oracle

MongoDB

Trino

Job description

Seeking an Application Development Lead with deep knowledge and hands-on experience with the Starburst Data Federation and Virtualization platform for a key initiative in the organization’s Data Strategy.

Key Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary technical interface between downstream analytical consumers and upstream data source owners.
• Lead the end-to-end technical onboarding of new data catalogs in Starburst using native Starburst connectors (Hive/Iceberg, Oracle, S3).
• Establish operational guidelines with resource and query limits to prevent federated queries from causing performance degradation on critical transactional databases.
• Partner with upstream data stewards to ensure accuracy of business glossaries, data dictionaries, lineage mappings, and data classification tags.
• Implement and govern centralized authorization policies using Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Row-Level Filters in Apache Ranger.
• Define data onboarding standards for Hive/Iceberg table formats, including partitioning schemes, sorting keys, file formats (Parquet/ORC), and statistics collection strategies.
• Validate and tune pushdown capabilities (predicate pushdown, projection pushdown, join pushdown) for newly onboarded data sources to ensure query federation performance.
• Conduct capacity forecasting, analyze query cost efficiency, and implement optimization strategies such as materialization to maximize cluster throughput.
• Partner closely with enterprise technology enablement teams, data architects, and domain engineers to design, build, and publish standardized, reusable Data Products using Starburst and open data formats.
• Integrate data products with enterprise data catalogs, governance marketplaces, and BI consumption tools, ensuring end-to-end discoverability, automated lineage, and governed access.

Required Qualifications

• 2+ years of hands-on experience with the Starburst Data Federation and Virtualization platform.
• Deep understanding of Trino architecture, Apache Ranger policies, Starburst Data Products, and the Iceberg table format.
• 6+ years of hands-on experience in Application Development.
• Strong understanding of software architecture principles and distributed system design (Microservices, Event-Driven Architecture).
• Extensive experience with relational (Oracle) and NoSQL databases (MongoDB), including advanced SQL.
• Experience with Big Data technologies (Apache Spark, Hadoop, Kafka) and data warehousing.
• Proven expertise in designing, developing, and securing RESTful APIs and integration patterns.
• Hands-on experience with CI/CD systems (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Bitbucket Pipelines) for automated deployment.
• Highly experienced with Unix-based operating systems and shell scripting.
• Strong background in cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), including containerization (Docker) and contributing to Kubernetes orchestration.
• Advanced troubleshooting, debugging, and performance optimization for distributed systems.
• Proficiency in automated testing frameworks (Pytest, unittest) and TDD methodologies.
• Solid understanding of secure coding practices and application security principles (OWASP Top 10).
• Expertise in Git (Bitbucket, GitHub) for advanced branching and pull request workflows.
• Proven ability to lead and mentor a global data engineering and platform operations team across multiple time zones.
• Practical experience with AI tools (Copilot, Devin, Claude/Gemini/GPT) for development workflows.

Desirable Qualifications

• Deep understanding and practical experience with Agile/Scrum methodologies.
• Exceptional ability to manage priorities and tasks effectively.
• Strong analytical, logical, systems thinking, and critical analysis skills.
• Excellent written and verbal communication for diverse audiences.
• Ability to work independently, take ownership, and collaborate effectively in global teams.
• Polyglot programming exposure (e.g., Java).
• Relevant cloud or industry Certifications.
• Experience with banking domains (Finance, Forecasting, Treasury).

Education

• Bachelor's degree/University degree or equivalent experience
• Master's degree preferred

This job description provides a high-level review of the types of work performed. Other job-related duties may be assigned as required.

Job Family Group

Technology

Job Family

Applications Development

Time Type

Full time

Primary Location

Tampa Florida United States

Primary Location Full Time Salary Range

$113,840.00 - $170,760.00

In addition to salary, Citi’s offerings may also include, for eligible employees, discretionary and formulaic incentive and retention awards. Citi offers competitive employee benefits, including: medical, dental & vision coverage; 401(k); life, accident, and disability insurance; and wellness programs. Citi also offers paid time off packages, including planned time off (vacation), unplanned time off (sick leave), and paid holidays. For additional information regarding Citi employee benefits, please visit citibenefits.com. Available offerings may vary by jurisdiction, job level, and date of hire.

Most Relevant Skills

Please see the requirements listed above.

Other Relevant Skills

For complementary skills, please see above and/or contact the recruiter.

Anticipated Posting Close Date

Oct 13, 2026

Automated Processing and AI

We use automated processing, including artificial intelligence, for our legitimate business interests (or our reasonable and appropriate business purposes) to identify and align the candidate's skills and abilities with a specific job opening. Additionally, if you so choose, or consent, we can match your skills and abilities to other suitable roles at Citi.Importantly, all our hiring processes and decisions, including determining your suitability for a role, are conducted, checked, and decided by individuals. Our automated processing and AI do not involve relying on automatic or autonomous decision-making. Please refer to any Jurisdictional Considerations, with specific provisions for your country (where relevant) for further details.

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