Senior Data Platform Engineer
About This Role
As a Senior Data Platform Engineer, you'll design, build, and operate reliable systems across Alpaca's data platform — from distributed query engines and lakehouse storage to streaming infrastructure, governance, and data serving. You'll also work closely with the AI and Data Science teams to enable agentic workflows and machine learning capabilities. As part of a small team, you'll contribute across multiple initiatives, own projects from design through production, and help shape the platform's future. The team is 100% distributed and remote.
What You'll Be Doing
Design, build, and operate core data platform infrastructure, including distributed query engines, lakehouse storage, orchestration, and streaming pipelines.
Contribute to regional platform deployments, building scalable and repeatable infrastructure using Kubernetes and infrastructure-as-code.
Develop real-time data processing, analytics, and alerting capabilities for operational and product use cases.
Partner with AI and Data Science teams on platform foundations for agentic workflows, evaluations, and ML lifecycle tooling.
Evolve the data catalog, governance, and access controls so data remains discoverable and properly governed.
Own platform reliability through observability, on-call participation, and operational improvements, collaborating with cross-functional teams.
What We're Looking For
5+ years of experience in data infrastructure, platform engineering, or software engineering, with demonstrated end-to-end ownership of production systems.
Strong Python and SQL skills, with experience building reliable pipelines, services, or platform tooling.
Experience building or operating distributed data systems, such as query engines, lakehouses, or streaming platforms.
Experience operating cloud infrastructure using Kubernetes, infrastructure-as-code, and deployment automation.
Sound operational judgment, clear technical communication, and the ability to collaborate across engineering teams.
Bonus Points
Experience with distributed query engines such as Trino, Presto, or Spark, and open table formats such as Apache Iceberg.
Experience with streaming and real-time data infrastructure such as Kafka, Redpanda, Flink, or Debezium.
Experience with AI and agent infrastructure, including MCP servers, retrieval systems, agent observability, or LLM evaluation.
Experience supporting ML infrastructure using technologies such as MLflow, Vertex AI, or similar platforms.
Experience with real-time analytics engines such as ClickHouse, Pinot, or Druid.
Experience designing and operating infrastructure across multiple cloud regions, including workload isolation and cost-performance trade-offs.
Why Join Us
Competitive salary and stock options.
Health benefits.
A one-time $500 USD new-hire home-office setup allowance.
A monthly stipend of $150 USD via a Brex Card.
Ready to Apply?
To submit your application for this position, please visit Alpaca's official website and follow their application process.