- +3
- +8
- California, United States
About
Cleanlab is on a mission to democratize safe, trustworthy, and reliable generative AI. We’re the team behind cleanlab , the popular open-source framework for ML data quality with 10k+ GitHub stars, used by top companies worldwide. Our research has been published in top AI conferences. We productionize our research in the form of APIs and web applications to help organizations tackle one of generative AI’s biggest challenges: ensuring safe and reliable outputs at scale.
The role
As a Backend Software Engineer at Cleanlab, you’ll architect and build the critical infrastructure behind the Cleanlab AI safety and reliability platform (TLM and Codex ) that detects, evaluates, and remediates problematic outputs from generative AI systems. You’ll work on technically challenging problems at the intersection of distributed systems, ML infrastructure, and data engineering to build technology that helps organizations deploy AI with confidence.
We’re an early-stage startup, and we don’t do titles. This position is comparable to a Senior or Staff level position at other companies, typically requiring 5+ years of software engineering experience with demonstrated expertise in building production systems.
What you might work on
Designing and implementing backend features to support real-time evaluation, issue detection, visualization, interpretation, and remediation of AI outputs
Optimizing our systems for scalability, reliability, and low latency
Ideating and prototyping novel product features enabled by our research
Collaborating with our data scientists and machine learning engineers to integrate feedback
Technical environment
You’ll work with a modern, cloud-native stack:
Infrastructure : Kubernetes, Helm, and Terraform
Cloud : Multi-cloud across AWS, Azure, and GCP
We’re looking for engineers who are:
Zero-to-one builders
who are comfortable building systems from scratch
System thinkers
who design elegant architectures that anticipate future needs
Problem solvers
who thrive on tackling complex technical challenges without clear solutions
Craftspeople
who take pride in writing clean, maintainable, and well-tested code
Fast learners
who quickly adapt to new technologies and domains
Communicators
who can explain technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical teammates
Experience that stands out
While we value the depth that comes with 5+ years of engineering experience, we care more about impact than years. What makes candidates truly stand out:
Production systems experience : You’ve built and maintained systems that real users depend on
Python expertise : You know the language deeply, including its strengths and weaknesses for backend systems
API design experience : You’ve created intuitive interfaces that developers love to use
Distributed systems knowledge : You understand the challenges of building reliable, scalable services
Team and growth
You’ll join a tight-knit engineering team working directly with our founders (3 ML/systems PhDs from MIT). As an early team member, you’ll have significant input on architecture decisions and the opportunity to grow into a technical leadership role as we scale.
We operate with the speed of a startup while maintaining a sustainable pace that allows for deep work. We believe the best engineers need time to think, experiment, and occasionally go down rabbit holes to find elegant solutions.
Cleanlab strives to be a place where high-potential individuals come together to build something great. We value grit and the ability to learn quickly as much as skill and experience. If you’re a great hacker , you believe in our mission, and you identify with our culture , we want to talk to you — even if your background doesn’t perfectly match this description.
Working at Cleanlab is awesome! Beyond the opportunity to work at a well-funded AI startup with an incredible, friendly founding team of MIT graduates,
all full-time employees receive the following :
Professional development stipend to keep up with the latest innovations in ML and software.
401(k) with employer match.
Work with a talented team unified by a vision to solve challenging problems in artificial intelligence.
Competitive salary (+ equity offering for certain roles), with regular opportunities for a raise if things are going well.
Relocation bonus to move to San Francisco.
The compensation range for this role is $150,000 to $300,000. The final offer details are determined by several factors including candidate experience/expertise and may vary from the pay range provided.
About us
Prior to Cleanlab, our founders (3 ML/systems PhDs from MIT) worked at OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, AWS, Facebook AI Research (FAIR), Dropbox, Oculus, Palantir, NASA, General Electric, MIT Lincoln Laboratory, MIT, Harvard, and Stanford. At every place we worked we repeatedly encountered the same issue: AI solutions failed to work reliably on real-world, human-centric data due to label errors and poor data quality. So, we spent eight years of PhD research at MIT inventing a new field to solve this problem and after successful pilots with world-leading organizations, Cleanlab emerged.
Everything we do at Cleanlab is guided by our north star — to help companies build reliable AI applications — unlocking the ability to use AI on many real-world applications where reliability is paramount. We develop next-generation data-centric AI, open-source algorithms and build APIs and web applications to help individuals and teams at companies across all industries build reliable AI.
While many companies can help build AI models, there exist few solutions today to build make this AI reliable, which is essential for production deployments of AI. This is where you come in. At Cleanlab, you’ll be able to take ownership of critical projects that pioneer the future of AI reliability.
Read how Cleanlab went from MIT PhD research to tech used by Amazon, Google, etc here .
See what Google, Tencent, and other Cleanlab users think here .
#J-18808-Ljbffr
Nice-to-have skills
- Python
- Kubernetes
- Terraform
- AWS
- Azure
- GCP
- API Design
- Distributed Systems
Work experience
- Backend
- Data Engineer
- Software Architect
Languages
- English