Software Engineer II - Data Platform & Database Systems
About The Position
Windows runs on over a billion devices worldwide, and the Windows Data team turns the signal from that ecosystem into the insights that shape the product. We manage, optimize, improve, and extend several multi-petabyte modern MPP (massively parallel processing) database systems — engineering at a scale where familiar solutions stop working and the harder, more interesting problems begin. This is a code-intensive role. As a Software Engineer II, you'll work across cloud services, data platform engineering, database systems, and supporting data engineering, with room to go deep into the internals of distributed data and database engines: query execution, storage formats, and performance. We're an AI-native team. Artificial Intelligence (AI) assisted development and agentic tooling are part of the daily craft here — not just to produce code but to build tools and observe cloud-based systems at scale. This role is also at the intersection between Windows and data, potentially helping hundreds of millions of Windows users have a better experience. At Microsoft, our mission—to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more—guides how we partner with customers to deliver trusted, impactful solutions. With a growth mindset culture, we innovate responsibly and measure success by shared progress—people, teams, and customers. Join us to do meaningful work that changes the world and helps shape what’s next for everyone.
Requirements
- Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 2+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python OR equivalent experience.
Nice To Haves
- 3+ years of proven coding and debugging skills in object-oriented languages. C#, C++, Java, or equivalent.
- Practical experience with Kubernetes, StarRocks, Clickhouse, Kafka, Flink, Trino, real-time/NRT systems, open-source data platforms.
- Scripting language experience Python and SQL.
- Experience with cloud platforms and services, such as Azure, etc.
- Ability to collaborate effectively with teammates and work successfully in a group environment.
- Data science, experimentation, or model-building adjacent experience.
- Experience in designing, developing, and shipping code with secure continuous integration and continuous delivery practices (CI/CD).
- Experience with data streaming, data modeling, data warehousing, and ETL (extract/transform/load).
Responsibilities
- Build at a scale that changes the problem. Deploy, extend and operate multi-petabyte MPP — StarRocks, ClickHouse, Trino/Presto, Spark, Druid, Kusto.
- Go deep into database internals. Work on query execution, vectorized processing, cost-based optimization, and columnar storage formats such as Parquet and Arrow, and understand these engines from the inside out.
- Work across the stack and across languages. Move between services in Python, Java, and Go and performance-critical native code in C++ — deep expertise in any single language isn't expected, just a readiness to follow the problem wherever it leads.
- Engineer the lakehouse on cloud infrastructure working with open table formats (Delta Lake, Iceberg, Hudi, Paimon) and build on cloud services and container orchestration with Kubernetes.
- Practice AI-native engineering. Use AI-assisted development and agentic tooling as part of the daily workflow, build AI directly in decision-making systems and operations, and help define how the team uses it on real production systems.
- Own components and partner for impact. Shape architecture, make build-vs-adopt decisions, and own components end to end while partnering with data scientists and product managers on data that shapes decisions for hundreds of millions of Windows users.
Benefits
- Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here: https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
