Branch · 2 weeks ago
Lead Software Engineer - Event Processing Platform
Austin, TX
Full-time
Hybrid
Lead/Staff
$152K/yr - $198K/yr
8+ years expBranch is the leading provider of engagement and performance mobile SaaS solutions for growth-focused teams. In this role, you will own the event processing platform, defining libraries and patterns, leading schema evolution, and ensuring system reliability and observability.
App MarketingMobile AdvertisingMobile AppsSoftware
No H1B
Responsibilities
Own the paved road: Define and evolve the common libraries, patterns, and contracts (Protobuf/Avro, gRPC/HTTP) used by sdk, gateway, matching, attribution, and identity services
Schema evolution at scale: Lead contract-as-code strategy (compatibility rules, registry, linting), zero/low-downtime rollouts, backfill/replay plans, and migration tooling
Throughput & latency: Design and tune Kafka topologies (partitions, compaction, tiered storage), producer/consumer settings, batching/compression, and hot-path code to hit p95/p99 targets
State & storage architecture: Model data across Aerospike/DynamoDB/FDB (keys/range design, TTL, transactions, conflict resolution); eradicate hot keys and write amps; codify backup/restore
Reliability & recovery: Ship idempotency/effectively-once semantics, DLQs, reprocessing pipelines, multi-region readiness, chaos tests, and disaster-recovery drills (RPO/RTO goals)
Observability & SLOs: Standardize OpenTelemetry (traces/metrics/logs), golden signals, burn-rate alerts, and dashboards; make failure modes explainable with reason codes
Change safety: Feature flags, canary/blue-green, automated rollback, perf budgets in CI, and pre-merge contract/compat tests
Security & compliance by default: AuthN/Z between services, HMAC/signature verification at edges, PII controls, audit trails
Mentor & influence: Drive design reviews/RFCs, coach senior engineers, and partner with product teams as your customers
Qualification
Required
8-10+ years backend/platform experience; prior tech lead on a high-throughput, low-latency data system
Depth in Java,Kotlin and Go. Strong async/concurrency, profiling, and performance tuning
Real-world Kafka expertise (idempotent producers, EOS patterns, DLQ/replay, compaction/retention)
Hands-on with Aerospike and/or DynamoDB and/or FoundationDB (data modeling, transactions, hotspots, cost tuning)
Avro/Protobuf + schema registry, backward/forward compatibility, and contract testing in CI
Production-grade observability (Graphana), on-call readiness, and incident management
Clear, pragmatic communication; writes crisp design docs and drives cross-team alignment
Preferred
Identity graphs, attribution pipelines, or similar matching systems
Multi-region active/active, disaster recovery, chaos/latency injection
Stream processing (Flink/KStreams/Spark Structured Streaming) for enrichment/dedupe
Security hardening at the edge (rate limits, signatures, envelope encryption)
Benefits
Health and wellness programs
Paid time off
Retirement planning options
Company
Branch
Branch helps companies drive seamless mobile experiences through its linking infrastructure powering thousands of today's top brands.
201-500 employees
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
$667.05MKey Investors
New Enterprise AssociatesTenacity Venture CapitalPlayground Global
2022-02-10Series F· $300M
2021-11-01Secondary Market
2019-09-01Series E· $125M
Leadership Team
T
Tae Kim
VP of Sales, Americas
Recent News
2025-12-09
2025-09-09
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