Member of Technical Staff - Data Platform
The Data Platform team at xAI is responsible for building and operating the infrastructure that manages large-scale data transport and processing across the company. This includes core systems such as Apache Kafka, HDFS, Spark, Flink, and Trino, which support real-time machine learning pipelines, feed ranking, experimentation, analytics, and observability at a petabyte scale. The team handles latency-critical workloads, high-throughput streaming, and distributed compute systems that require fault tolerance, performance, and absolute reliability.
As a software engineer on the Data Platform team, you will design, build, and operate distributed systems that power xAI's data movement and compute. You will take ownership of infrastructure components that process trillions of events daily, driving the scalability, performance, and reliability of systems that support product and machine learning workloads across the company.
Key responsibilities include designing and implementing high-throughput, low-latency data ingestion and transport systems; scaling and optimizing multi-tenant Kafka infrastructure supporting real-time workloads; extending and tuning Spark, Flink, and Trino for demanding production pipelines; building interfaces, APIs, and pipelines enabling teams to query, process, and move data at a petabyte scale; debugging and optimizing distributed systems with a focus on reliability and performance under load; and collaborating with machine learning, product, and infrastructure teams to unblock critical data workflows.
Required qualifications include proven expertise in distributed systems, stream processing, or large-scale data platforms; proficiency in Rust, Go, Scala, or similar systems languages; hands-on experience with Kafka, Flink, Spark, Trino, or Hadoop in production; strong debugging, profiling, and performance optimization skills; a track record of shipping and maintaining critical infrastructure; and comfort working in fast-moving, high-stakes environments with minimal guardrails.
The annual salary range for this position is $180,000 to $440,000 USD. The total rewards package at xAI also includes equity, comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, access to a 401(k) retirement plan, short and long-term disability insurance, life insurance, and various other discounts and perks.