Software Engineer, Information Retrieval

Whatnot
Whatnot is the largest livestream shopping platform in North America and Europe to buy, sell, and discover the things you love. We're building the future of ecommerce, bringing together community, shopping and entertainment. We are committed to our values , and as a remote co-located team, we operate out of hubs within the US, UK, Ireland, Poland, and Germany today.
We're innovating in the fast-paced world of live auctions from fashion, beauty, electronics to collectibles like trading cards, comic books, and even live plants. Whatnot has something for everyone.
And, we're growing. Whatnot has been one of the fastest growing marketplaces and we're hiring forward-thinking problem solvers across all functional areas.
Role
The Data function at Whatnot creates services that improve our core product experience and unlock business value. We are looking for an engineer to join the team to work on information retrieval systems that power Discovery, Ads, and Marketplace.
As an engineer you will play a critical role in defining the technical direction and leading the development of the retrieval platform to power next-gen systems at Whatnot. You will be responsible for driving innovation, ensuring the scalability and performance of our systems, and working with a team of engineers to deliver high-quality solutions.
Working in a highly cross functional role, you'll also make key decisions about how we integrate data systems at Whatnot - and then make it happen. You'll be positioned to align efforts to optimize other aspects of our company's architecture, such as machine learning, real-time analytics, stream processing, and content understanding to name a few.
Team members in this role are required to be within commuting distance of our San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, or New York City hubs.
You
Curious about who thrives at Whatnot? We've found that low ego, a growth mindset, and bias into action goes a long way here.
As our next member of the team, you should have 5+ years of experience, plus:

• Focused expertise in information retrieval technologies such as search and vector databases and the ingest and serving pipelines to scale them
• Operational knowledge of scaling indices and nearest neighbor algorithms
• Successfully set the technical vision and direction of an end to end retrieval system
• Deep understanding of ElasticSearch/OpenSearch/SOLR including its internals such as Apache Lucene and its custom domain specific language and query engines
• Track record of building scalable and performant distributed systems

In addition to these role-specific qualifications, all engineering team members are expected to have:

• Experience managing cloud technologies (AWS or Google Cloud) and comfort with infrastructure-as-code approaches (e.g. Terraform).
• Proficiency in at least one server-side programming language (preferably Python), common algorithms and data structures, and software design principles.
• Self-starter ethic, thriving under a high level of autonomy.
• Exceptional interpersonal and communication skills.

Compensation
$185,000 - $245,000/year + benefits + equity
The salary range may be inclusive of several levels that would be applicable to the position. Final salary will be based on a number of factors including, level, relevant prior experience, skills and expertise. This range is only inclusive of base salary, not benefits (more details below) or equity.
Benefits

• Flexible Time off Policy and Company-wide Holidays (including a spring and winter break)
• Health Insurance options including Medical, Dental, Vision
• Work From Home Support
  • $1,000 home office setup allowance
  • $150 monthly allowance for cell phone and internet
• Care benefits
  • $450 monthly allowance on food
  • $500 monthly allowance for wellness
  • $5,000 annual allowance towards Childcare
  • $20,000 lifetime benefit for family planning, such as adoption or fertility expenses
• Retirement; 401k offering for Traditional and Roth accounts in the US (employer match up to 4% of base salary) and Pension plans internationally
• Parental Leave
  • 16 weeks of paid parental leave + one month gradual return to work *company leave allowances run concurrently with country leave requirements which take precedence.

EOE
Whatnot is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. We value diversity, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, parental status, disability status, or any other status protected by local law. We believe that our work is better and our company culture is improved when we encourage, support, and respect the different skills and experiences represented within our workforce.