Backend Engineer

Known•San Francisco, CA

4d•$200,000 - $350,000•Onsite

About The Position

Known is seeking exceptional backend engineers to build the infrastructure behind its core product, including real-time conversational AI, intelligent matchmaking, and autonomous agents. The role involves contributing to the technical foundation of an AI-native consumer product and solving engineering challenges across distributed systems, data infrastructure, and AI integrations. Engineers can choose which part of the backend stack they are most excited to work on and will own systems end-to-end, from architecture and implementation through deployment, monitoring, and scaling. The role is based in person in Cow Hollow, San Francisco.

Requirements

4–6 years of experience designing, building, and deploying production backend systems.
Strong proficiency in at least one backend language, such as Python, Go, TypeScript, or Java.
Experience designing APIs, distributed systems, and scalable service architectures.
Experience with relational databases, caching, asynchronous processing, and data infrastructure.
Experience with cloud infrastructure and deployment, such as Docker, Kubernetes, AWS, or GCP.
Strong product intuition and a bias toward shipping, iterating, and taking ownership.
Interest in building technology that could lead to a million marriages and babies.

Responsibilities

Design and scale backend services, APIs, and infrastructure that power Known’s core consumer experience.
Build real-time systems supporting conversational AI, voice interactions, and agentic workflows.
Architect data pipelines and storage systems for matchmaking, personalization, and machine learning.
Develop reliable, low-latency services connecting AI agents to real-world actions and third-party integrations.
Improve system performance, reliability, security, and scalability as the product grows.
Own systems end-to-end, from architecture and implementation to deployment, monitoring, and scaling.