Job description

At Sift, we’re redefining how modern machines are built, tested, and operated. Our platform gives engineers real-time observability over high-frequency telemetry—eliminating bottlenecks and enabling faster, more reliable development.

Sift was born from our work at SpaceX on Dragon, Falcon, Starlink, and Starship—where scaling telemetry, debugging flight systems, and ensuring mission reliability demanded new infrastructure. Founded by a team from SpaceX, Google, and Palantir, Sift is built for mission-critical systems where precision and scalability are non-negotiable.

As an early engineer at Sift, you won’t just write code—you’ll help define the architecture, shape the product, and influence the culture of a company focused on solving real engineering problems. If you’re looking for complex technical challenges and the opportunity to build foundational systems supporting complex machines from the ground up, we want to hear from you.

In This Role, You'll:

Design and build a high-performance, scalable, end-to-end data platform for hardware engineering
Design and build a delightful user interface for visualizing and transforming millions of data points
Work closely with customers, including hardware engineers, to understand their problems and find efficient solutions
Help define engineering culture, standards, and processes
Collaborate with peers on architecture, design, and code reviews

The Skillset You'll Bring:

Bachelor's degree in computer science, data science, engineering, math, physics, or STEM discipline
8+ years of experience in software engineering or data engineering
Experience designing and building large-scale, distributed systems or web applications using Go, Python, or an equivalent language
Self-starter, able to navigate ambiguity and changing priorities
Team player with excellent communication skills and a collaborative work ethic

Bonus Points:

Experience working with in-stream data processing and analytics using Apache Kafka, Flink, Beam, or similar
Experience with relational and non-relational databases, e.g. PostgreSQL, Druid, Pinot, Timescale, or similar
Experience with data exploration tools like Grafana, Jupyter Notebooks, Metabase, PowerBI, or similar
Strong understanding of DevOps principles: version control, testing, continuous integration, build, deployment, and monitoring
Front-end experience in React or a similar JavaScript framework

Engineering At Sift:

You'll have the opportunity to help evolve and scale our platform because we're still in the early stages of building the product. Relevant technologies include:

Web frontend & backend: ECharts, Go, gRPC, PostgreSQL, Protobuf, Radix, React, Redux, and TypeScript
Data: Arrow, DataFusion, Flink, Parquet, and Rust
Infrastructure: Argo CD, AWS, Docker, GitHub Actions, Grafana, Kubernetes, Kustomize, Linux, Prometheus, and Terragrunt

Location:

The Sift team is based in El Segundo, CA, and we collaborate in person twice a week—Mondays and Thursdays. We work closely with LA’s leading hardware companies, from autonomous vehicle manufacturers to spacecraft builders. Proximity matters for site visits and deep collaboration, so we prefer candidates local to Los Angeles. We are open to relocation and for exceptional talent we’re open to remote work from the San Francisco Bay Area.

Salary range: $170,000 - $220,000 per year. Plus equity and benefits.

Eligibility:

US Person Required: Must be a U.S. Citizen or Green Card Holder due to ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) / EAR (Export Administration Regulations) compliance requirements.

Required profile