Staff Software Engineer

About Rivian Rivian is on a mission to keep the world adventurous forever. This goes for the emissions-free Electric Adventure Vehicles we build, and the curious, courageous souls we seek to attract. As a company, we constantly challenge what’s possible, never simply accepting what has always been done. We reframe old problems, seek new solutions and operate comfortably in areas that are unknown. Our backgrounds are diverse, but our team shares a love of the outdoors and a desire to protect it for future generations. Role Summary We are seeking a Staff Software Engineer to play a key role in the evolution of our massive-scale backend data platform. In this role, you will contribute deeply to the architecture of the data ingestion and processing systems for Rivian's fleet. You will work alongside senior leaders to build high-throughput pipelines and resilient distributed systems that allow our ADAS engineers to query, replay, and analyze drive data in seconds. Responsibilities Data Querying at Scale: Spearhead complex initiatives, such as designing and building a unified search backend capable of executing low-latency queries across petabytes of historical drive and sensor data. System Architecture: Collaborate on the technical design of scalable, event-driven services on AWS. Help drive decisions on API design, synchronous vs. asynchronous processing, consistency models, and service boundaries for the broader platform. Data Pipeline Engineering: Develop high-volume data ingestion pipelines using Go (Golang) and Python. Leverage technologies such as AWS Lambda, SQS/SNS, or Kafka to process telematics and sensor data efficiently. Performance Optimization: Profile and optimize backend services for high throughput. Tackle concurrency challenges to ensure efficient resource utilization when processing MCAP files. Operational Excellence: Champion a DevOps culture. Define SLOs, implement comprehensive observability (metrics, distributed tracing, logging), and utilize Infrastructure as Code (Terraform) to ensure reproducible environments. Technical Leadership: Act as a technical multiplier and mentor. You will help set code review standards, guide mid-level engineers, and contribute to the technical roadmap of the data organization. Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner with peers to design efficient APIs, and work with Embedded/ML teams to understand evolving data formats and requirements. Qualifications Experience: Bachelor's or Master's in Computer Science or related field, with 8+ years of industry experience building distributed systems. Backend Mastery: Expert-level proficiency in Go (Golang) and/or Python. You know the standard libraries inside out and understand memory management and concurrency patterns. AWS Cloud Expertise: Deep architectural knowledge of the AWS ecosystem, such as Lambda, API Gateway, S3, DynamoDB, IAM, and container orchestration (EKS/ECS). Data Engineering: Experience building ETL/ELT pipelines and working with message queues and data stores. Understanding of stream processing concepts. Database Design: Strong understanding of database theory, including schema design, indexing strategies, and the trade-offs between SQL, NoSQL, and search-engine based solutions (e.g., Elasticsearch/OpenSearch). C++ Proficiency: Strong ability to read and write C++. While this is primarily a backend role, the ability to interface with core ADAS libraries or wrap C++ SDKs is strongly preferred. Preferred Skills (Bonus): Robotics Domain Knowledge: Familiarity with robotics data standards (ROS/DDS, MCAP, Protobuf) and sensor data types (LiDAR point clouds, Radar, Cameras). Fullstack Development: Experience with frontend development using TypeScript and React. Workflow Orchestration: Experience with tools like Airflow, Dagster, or AWS Step Functions. #LI-Hybrid Equal Opportunity Rivian is an equal opportunity employer and complies with all applicable federal, state, and local fair employment practices laws. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender expression, gender identity, genetic information or characteristics, physical or mental disability, marital/domestic partner status, age, military/veteran status, medical condition, or any other characteristic protected by law. Rivian is committed to ensuring that our hiring process is accessible for persons with disabilities. If you have a disability or limitation, such as those covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act, that requires accommodations to assist you in the search and application process, please email us at candidateaccommodations@rivian.com. Candidate Data Privacy Rivian may collect, use and disclose your personal information or personal data (within the meaning of the applicable data protection laws) when you apply for employment and/or participate in our recruitment processes (“Candidate Personal Data”). This data includes contact, demographic, communications, educational, professional, employment, social media/website, network/device, recruiting system usage/interaction, security and preference information. Rivian may use your Candidate Personal Data for the purposes of (i) tracking interactions with our recruiting system; (ii) carrying out, analyzing and improving our application and recruitment process, including assessing you and your application and conducting employment, background and reference checks; (iii) establishing an employment relationship or entering into an employment contract with you; (iv) complying with our legal, regulatory and corporate governance obligations; (v) recordkeeping; (vi) ensuring network and information security and preventing fraud; and (vii) as otherwise required or permitted by applicable law. Rivian may share your Candidate Personal Data with (i) internal personnel who have a need to know such information in order to perform their duties, including individuals on our People Team, Finance, Legal, and the team(s) with the position(s) for which you are applying; (ii) Rivian affiliates; and (iii) Rivian’s service providers, including providers of background checks, staffing services, and cloud services. Rivian may transfer or store internationally your Candidate Personal Data, including to or in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the European Union and in the cloud, and this data may be subject to the laws and accessible to the courts, law enforcement and national security authorities of such jurisdictions. Please note that we are currently not accepting applications from third party application services.