pinecone - Senior/Staff Software Engineer, Search & Retrieval Infrastructure
Requirements
• To thrive in this role, you don't need to check every single box, but you should be deeply passionate about how to turn data into knowledge. • Systems Expertise • Architectural Depth: You have a proven track record (typically 6+ years) of shipping production-grade backends for large-scale systems. You don’t just write code; you design for high throughput, low latency, and long-term maintainability. • Data Engineering Savvy: You’re comfortable building high-throughput indexing pipelines that handle both the messy world of unstructured data and the rigid world of structured schemas. • Retrieval Intuition: You understand that "search" is more than just a keyword match. You have direct experience (or deep theoretical knowledge) in semantic search, vector databases, hybrid retrieval strategies, or with traditional search engines like Elastic or OpenSearch. • RAG & Orchestration: You understand the nuances of Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) patterns, from embedding pipelines and hybrid search techniques to how query planning and metadata filtering can make or break an LLM's performance. • Language Fluency: You are an expert in at least one major language like Go, Rust, C++, Java, or Python. • Infrastructure: Familiarity and experience with modern infrastructure tools, such as Kubernetes, cloud-native architectures, and observability frameworks, as well as infrastructure-as-code tools like Terraform or Pulumi. • Ownership & Impact • Product Thinking: You don't just build to spec; you build for the user. You can design clean, intuitive APIs that both human developers and autonomous agents will love. • Ambiguity Navigator: You’re comfortable in a high-growth environment. You prefer "owning a problem" over "executing a ticket." • Experience building multi-tenant SaaS platforms. • Experience with retrieval evaluation frameworks—knowing how to actually measure "good" search results. • Experience with query planning or agentic reasoning loops (e.g., teaching a system how to break down a complex prompt into multiple specific steps).
Responsibilities
• Design and build scalable platform components leveraging advanced retrieval via query planning, semantic and hybrid search, metadata-aware search, and LLM generation. • Design and build optimized indexing pipelines for structured and unstructured data. • Build backend services for semantic and hybrid retrieval, knowledge graph construction, and retrieval orchestration. • Improve retrieval quality through evaluation and observability frameworks. • Design APIs for internal and external user and agentic consumers. • Optimize latency, throughput and cost across large-scale inference and retrieval workloads. • Drive technical direction for reliability and security.
Benefits
• $180K – $220K • Offers Equity • Autofill from resume • Upload your resume here to autofill key application fields. • Drop your resume here! • Parsing your resume. Autofilling key fields... • This job has application limits • Please Note: we have set up limits for applications for this role. It is in the General group. The following limits apply to applications for all jobs within this group: • Candidates may not apply more than 2 times in any 60 day span for any job in the General Group. • Candidates may not re-apply to the same role within 365 days if not presented with an offer • Candidates may not re-apply to any role within the General group within 365 days if not presented with an offer • Pinecone Application • Preferred Pronouns • did not provide • Linkedin Profile • Please attach LinkedIn URL • or drag and drop here • Will you now, or in the future, require sponsorship (i.e. H-1B visa, etc.) to legally work in the U.S.? If so, are you currently in a period of Optional Practical Training (OPT/CPT)? • Pinecone does support visa / immigration needs for perspective candidates • Yes (I have OPT / CPT) • Are you currently engage in any side businesses, hold board positions, serve in nonprofit roles, maintain academic commitments, or have any other obligations that you anticipate continuing while employed with us? If yes, please provide details. • U.S. Standard Demographic Questions • We invite applicants to share their demographic background. If you choose to complete this survey, your responses may be used to identify areas of improvement in our hiring process. • Are you a veteran or active member of the United States Armed Forces? • I don't wish to answer • I prefer to self-describe • No, I am not a veteran or active member • Yes, I am a veteran or active member • Do you have a disability or chronic condition (physical, visual, auditory, cognitive, mental, emotional, or other) that substantially limits one or more of your major life activities, including mobility, communication (seeing, hearing, speaking), and learning? • Do you identify as transgender? • How would you describe your sexual orientation? (mark all that apply) • Bisexual and/or pansexual • How would you describe your racial/ethnic background? (mark all that apply) • White or European • Southeast Asian • Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander • Middle Eastern or North African • Indigenous, American Indian or Alaska Native • Hispanic, Latinx or of Spanish Origin • Black or of African descent • How would you describe your gender identity? (mark all that apply) • U.S. EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY INFORMATION (Completion is voluntary and will not subject you to adverse treatment)
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