Software Engineer - Backend

About the role

Helsing is seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to develop AI-based capabilities and infrastructure for semi-autonomous defense platforms. You'll work on distributed systems, embedded computing, robotics, and machine learning systems that operate in challenging real-world environments with critical reliability requirements.

What you'll do

• Review code contributions, proposals, and RFCs from colleagues
• Propose and implement new features, capabilities, algorithms, and infrastructure across the stack
• Mentor team members and support the interviewing pipeline
• Share technical knowledge through tech talks and learning groups
• Maintain existing software stack (Rust and Python) and work with customers to identify issues
• Develop tests and benchmarks to ensure system robustness
• Present work at weekly demo sessions for feedback and collaboration

What you'll need

• Ability to write legible, maintainable, and performant code
• Strong English communication skills, both verbal and written
• Experience collaborating through code reviews and pair programming
• Comfort working asynchronously with PRs, RFCs, and email discussions
• Backend development experience with languages like Rust, Java, Go, or C++
• Familiarity with backend interfaces like REST, GraphQL, gRPC, and Arrow
• Commitment to continuous improvement and ethical engineering practices

Nice to have

• Rust and Python experience
• Container-based and cloud-native architectures (Docker, Azure, AWS)
• Metrics tooling (Prometheus, Grafana, ELK)
• SQL and streaming database systems
• Routing protocols (IGP, BGP)
• Cryptographic protocols (Signal, WireGuard)
• Hardware interfaces and robotics experience
• Production ML systems experience