Senior Software Engineer - Backend
$140k - $173k USD
Develop state-of-the-art products. Make sense of the future. Use data to drive business.
If you are passionate about building awesome products, we want you to help us make a huge impact. Our clients love our products and are thirsty for more!
At CB Insights we build products that help clients make sense of the future and drive their businesses forward using data. Our system retrieves large amounts of structured and unstructured data sets and uses scientific methods to extract knowledge and insights. We present those analytics through a sophisticated, dynamic user interface which enables our clients to find answers to their most important questions.
The Role You'll Play:
As a Senior Backend Engineer at CB Insights you will be part of a cross-disciplinary, self-motivated team with clear ownership and passion to form the future. Our team uses state-of-the-art technologies and writes quality code that ships often.
We focus on modularity and reuse where it makes sense, while ensuring that there are no constraints to delivering world-class software continuously.
About the team:
You will be part of a remote team located in the USA. We have a collaborative, “teach and learn” culture where the role evolves with your interests.
If this sounds interesting to you, reach out and join CB Insights now!
Your Main Tasks:
- Develop features for our next generation market intelligence platform on a small Agile team, with a primary focus on our search infrastructure and capabilities. Areas of ownership include search relevance, query optimization, and indexing strategies for large-scale data retrieval.
- Consistently and frequently deliver solutions that are well-engineered, maintainable and tested within the agreed upon timeframe.
- Participate in code reviews and sprint planning, help identify opportunities, work through challenges and share knowledge with colleagues.
- Collaborate with the product team to understand business requirements.
What you bring to the table:
- Proficiency in Go or Python for developing scalable applications.
- Hands-on experience with containerized microservices using Docker and Kubernetes.
- Expertise in writing and executing unit and integration tests to ensure application quality and reliability.
- Experience with monitoring and observability tools such as Datadog.
- Proficient with cloud services, particularly AWS (EC2, S3, RDS, Lambda).
- Familiarity with Lean and Agile values and principles, working in collaborative, cross-functional remote teams.
- Experience working with both relational databases like MySQL and PostgreSQL.
- Familiarity with non-relational databases such as MongoDB and DynamoDB.
- Familiarity with Apache Kafka and Kafka Connect for real-time data processing and integration.
- Experience with search technologies, full-text search, or distributed data systems
- Understanding of information retrieval concepts such as relevance scoring, ranking, and query optimization
Please note this is a US-based role.
In addition to base salary listed below, this role is also eligible for a bonus opportunity.
Compensation
$140,000—$173,000 USD
What we're all about
CB Insights is the leader in predictive intelligence on private companies—turning exclusive data on millions of firms into early, trusted signals on future performance and direction. The company pioneered predictive intelligence with its Mosaic Score—the first system to reliably forecast the outlook for a private company—and has since built it into a comprehensive platform of AI and data capabilities. Today, leading strategy, investment, and business development teams rely on CB Insights to identify the right companies, markets, and opportunities before their competitors do.
CB Insights Leadership Principles
At CB Insights, everyone is expected to be a leader. These leadership principles are like an operating system for our culture. Use the principles as a practical guide to making decisions.
We are what we repeatedly do. By living the principles outlined below, we will build an outstanding company and do insanely great work.
- Solve customer problems. It’s our highest calling. Designing a product? Start from the customer problem it solves. Updating our sales process? Flip it around, and simplify the customer buying process.
- Think BIG! Start small. Great changes start with a first step. Find it. Take it. Build a system around what works. This is the secret to bringing a vision to life.
- Go and see with your own eyes. Meet the customer, use the product, talk to the field. Great systems aren’t built from afar.
- Priorities: Choose one. Leaders give the gift of clarity. They find the most important thing and do it. Max power. Top speed.
- Danger zones:
- Bureaucracy. May the best ideas and execution win.
- Complexity. Leaders use frameworks and systems to simplify.
- No commitment. Leaders don’t compromise just to get along. Debate. Disagree. But once a decision is made, commit.
- Leaving what’s important unsaid or undone. No “circling back.”
- Data informs. Insight transforms. Pull the thread. Ask why. Leaders are curious. They use what they learn to create clarity.
- Insist on excellence. Leaders set high standards and overcome obstacles. They do the kind of work they’re excited to share with the world.
- Live off the land. Leaders creatively use resources already available to them – especially AI – to execute and automate their work.
- Good judgment. Leaders have it. Where it comes from: insight, listening, first-hand experience. How to apply it: carefully on big, hard to reverse decisions. Swiftly on limited, easy to reverse ones.
- Help others. Leaders know we’re building this together.
You’ll want to work here if
- You are excited about how AI is transforming tech
- You are hungry for feedback and the chance to grow
- Your instinct is to work smarter not harder
- You love developing as a SME with a strong POV
- You are motivated by challenges and big ideas
- You believe in radical personal accountability
You don’t want to work here if:
- You are a tech pessimist
- Radical Candor is not your style
- You like to build big processes
- You stay @ the 30,000 foot view instead of digging into the details
- You prefer to operate in your comfort zone
- You expect to be judged by outputs instead of outcomes
What we offer:
- Industry Insight: over 500k+ people follow our tech newsletter: sign up here
- Holistic compensation: Competitive cash compensation, comprehensive healthcare coverage (PPO, HSA, and FSA options), multiple mental health resources, 401(k) with company match, annual professional development stipend, and generous paid time off.
About Our Pay Practices
We believe in recognizing and rewarding excellence. Our commitment to fairness means that compensation decisions are informed by qualifications, location, internal equity, and current market data. While we aim to hire at our established Hiring Target, starting pay may vary based on factors such as market rates, the qualified pool of candidates, and individual experience.
Equal Opportunity Employer: At CB Insights we know that innovation comes from collaboration, belonging, and diverse perspectives. We’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer - all applicants are considered for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.