Senior Systems Software Engineer

About the role

This role focuses on developing system-level components for blockchain infrastructure, emphasizing high-performance computing. The engineer will be responsible for designing distributed systems to meet strict availability and latency requirements, specifically aiming for 99.9% availability and p95 latency of 200 ms or less. This involves gathering requirements, implementing solutions in C, C++, and Rust, and ensuring the systems are robust and efficient.

A key aspect of this position involves optimizing system performance through benchmarking and profiling, as well as managing the lifecycle of APIs and endpoints. The engineer will also contribute to secure networking protocols, cryptographic primitives, and fault-tolerant ETL pipelines. Success in this role means delivering highly performant, scalable, and reliable blockchain infrastructure that can handle global-scale applications.

The team at Unto Labs is dedicated to pushing distributed systems to their limits, reimagining core consensus primitives and networking stacks. This role requires collaboration on design reviews, mentoring junior engineers, and coordinating with product, infrastructure, and legal teams to deliver solutions. The engineer will also contribute to maintaining a suite of APIs, SDKs, and developer tools for external use.

The annual salary for this position ranges from $213,512 to $220,000 USD, in addition to significant equity potential.

Skills that matter here

• C: Used for designing and implementing core system-level components within the blockchain infrastructure.
• C++: Applied in developing high-performance blockchain infrastructure, similar to C, for system-level programming.
• Rust: Utilized for implementing system-level components, contributing to the security and performance of distributed systems.
• Terraform: Used for automating the provisioning and scaling of server fleets, both on-premise and in the cloud.
• Kubernetes: Applied for automating deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications within the infrastructure.
• GitHub Actions: Used for designing and implementing CI/CD pipelines, migrating legacy computing pipelines to modern frameworks.

Who this role suits

• A candidate with a Master’s degree in Computer Science or a related field, possessing at least 10 years of experience in systems engineering.
• Someone who has direct experience with low-level performance optimization and hardware interfacing.
• An individual skilled in distributed systems and threading runtimes, with a background in CI/CD pipeline design.
• A professional who has worked with distributed ledger technologies or crypto-economic distributed systems.

From the employer

Responsibilities

• Design and implement system-level components for blockchain infrastructure using C, C++, and Rust.
• Maintain strong emphasis on computer systems analysis and implementation.
• Gather requirements for high-throughput, low-latency (≤ 200 ms p95) services; design distributed systems that meet 99.9 % availability SLAs.
• Perform benchmarking and performance profiling to enhance execution efficiency.
• Specify, version, and maintain public and internal APIs plus JSON-RPC/gRPC endpoints.
• Document interfaces and generate strongly typed client libraries.
• Collaborate on the development of secure, low-latency networking protocols and cryptographic primitives. Build fault-tolerant ETL pipelines that transform on-chain events into query optimized relational & NoSQL stores.
• Tune indexes for millisecond reads.
• Provision and scale commodity server fleets (on-prem & cloud).
• Automate with Terraform/Kubernetes, monitor health, capacity, and SLOs. Migrate legacy computing pipelines to modern CI/CD frameworks.
• Support the design of fault-tolerant systems with advanced debugging, logging, and error recovery functionality.
• Model token-economic incentives, auction fee markets, and validator/operator behaviors; prototype algorithms and run agent-based simulations.
• Leverage generative-AI coding agents, static analyzers, and self-healing runbooks to accelerate delivery and cut MTTR.
• Review performance metrics to refine software components for memory and process or efficiency.
• Profile CPU, I/O, and network paths; execute load-tests; instrument metrics/tracing/logs; drive post-mortems and capacity plans.
• Maintain and manage a performant suite of APIs, SDKs, and developer tools for consumption by external developers.
• Integrate cryptographic primitives, secure key management, vulnerability scanning, and incident response playbooks.
• Write RFCs, lead design reviews, mentor junior engineers, and coordinate cross-functional delivery with product, infra, and legal teams.
• 100% telecommuting/working from home permitted from various and unanticipated locations throughout the U.S.

Qualifications

• This position requires a Master’s degree, or foreign equivalent, in Economics, Business Economics, Computer Science, or a related field.
• 10 years of experience as a Systems Engineer, Software Engineer, Software Developer, Information Technology Officer, or a related occupation.
• Additionally, the applicant must have employment experience with:
• Systems programming in C, C++, and Rust;
• Low-level performance optimization and hardware interfacing;
• Distributed systems and threading runtimes;
• CI/CD pipeline design using GitHub Actions and on-prem infrastructure;
• Work with multiple systems, including web development platforms, high-performance computing systems, core operating system kernels, developer tools, and systems related to economic applications;
• Develop distributed ledger technologies or crypto economic distributed systems.

Compensation and Benefits

• Competitive salary ($213,512 - $220,000 USD)
• Significant equity and upside potential
• Flexible work environment
• Unlimited vacation policy
• Health insurance
• Hardware and development tool allowance
• Conference and learning budget