Senior/Staff Backend Engineer

About us: Lighten envisions a future where clinical data can drive the next generation of human health breakthroughs -- from uncovering personalized treatment insights, to accelerating drug discoveries and driving adoption of innovative therapies. Lighten builds AI-native software platforms to transform raw clinical data into the highest quality patient journeys to accelerate evidence generation for R&D and bring life-saving therapies to the market faster. We partner with and empower life sciences and healthcare organizations to deliver on their mission for the benefit of the patients they serve.We offer competitive salary and employee equity options, 3% company-sponsored 401k contributions, and comprehensive medical, dental and vision insurance for employees and their families.We offer competitive salary and employee equity options, 3% company-sponsored 401k contributions, and comprehensive medical, dental and vision insurance for employees and their families.Founding Cloud Infrastructure Engineer (Senior or Staff level)You Can Expect ToOwn the architecture, design, development and operations of platform infrastructure and customer facing deployments and contribute to launching our first product from 0 to 1 that can handle heterogeneous sources of healthcare data at scale.Prototype, optimize, and maintain scalable back-end API services that will power new ML and LLM model powered development workflowsDevelop automated processes that build, deploy and test softwareDesign and implement/procure cybersecurity solutions that are compliant with all customer requirements and healthcare regulationsOptimize web applications for performance, speed, and scalability, ensuring fast load times and smooth user interactions. Write clean, well-structured, and maintainable code following best practices and coding standards. Conduct code reviews, provide constructive feedback, and collaborate with team members to improve code quality and maintainability.Design storage solutions and data models that grow with the teams mission and ambitionsBe an engaged team player in a customer-focused cross-functional environment where you will feel excited to take on whatever is most impactful for the company and productHave the ability to work in person in San Mateo, CA at least 3-4 days a week We Look ForProficiency in Python backend API development and Terraform5+ years Experience in Backend Engineering, Dev Ops, Site Reliability Engineering or similar infrastructure rolesSolid understanding of cybersecurity solutions and best practices.Knowledge of cloud services (AWS, Azure, GCP) and containerization technologies (Docker, Kubernetes).Experience in delivering distributed and ML systems and services in a production setting for cloud-native applicationsExperience with distributed compute frameworks and data processing pipelinesAbility to design and build efficient scalable data storage, compute, and retrieval systems for AI/ML tasksPrevious experience with healthcare data is beneficial but not requiredLocated in the San Francisco Bay Area or willing to relocateWe are proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer and are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. We embrace diversity and provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment. We prohibit discrimination and harassment of any type on the basis of race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, performance, merit, and business need.