Staff Backend Engineer

<h2><strong>About Astra</strong></h2><p style="min-height:1.5em">Astra is a high-impact engineering team building mission-critical financial infrastructure. Our fintech platform powers payment processing, fraud detection, and financial compliance for businesses handling 100M+ in weekly transaction volume. We maintain 99.9%+ uptime, process complex cross-border payments, and coordinate with multiple third-party financial services while meeting strict regulatory requirements.</p><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>The Role</strong></h2><p style="min-height:1.5em">We're looking for a Senior/Staff Backend Engineer to architect and build complex financial systems that process millions of dollars daily. You'll be one of our core engineers designing cross-domain solutions that coordinate payments, fraud detection, compliance, and user management across our distributed microservices architecture.</p><p style="min-height:1.5em">This role requires deep systems thinking, technical leadership, and the ability to solve complex engineering challenges that span multiple domains and external integrations.</p><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>What You'll Do</strong></h2><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Architect Critical Financial Systems: Design and implement payment processing, fraud detection, and compliance systems that handle millions of dollars daily with strict regulatory requirements</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Lead Cross-Domain Solutions: Coordinate complex interactions between payments, fraud detection, user management, and compliance systems</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Drive Technical Decisions: Lead architecture decisions that impact our entire platform and establish best practices for a growing team</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Mentor Engineers: Guide junior engineers and establish coding standards, design patterns, and engineering practices</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Optimize System Performance: Improve reliability and performance across our distributed microservices architecture</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Collaborate Across Teams: Work closely with product and compliance teams to design systems that meet business and regulatory requirements</p></li></ul><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>What We're Looking For</strong></h2><p style="min-height:1.5em"><strong>Staff Backend Engineer Requirements</strong></p><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">8+ years of software engineering experience building complex, production systems</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">3+ years of technical leadership experience (mentoring, architecture decisions, cross-team coordination)</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Demonstrated systems engineering experience solving complex, cross-domain challenges</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Strong foundation in algorithms, data structures, and computer science fundamentals</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Experience with distributed systems, event-driven architectures, and microservices</p></li></ul><p style="min-height:1.5em"><strong>Education</strong></p><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field required</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Master's degree in Computer Science or Engineering from an accredited university highly preferred</p></li></ul><p style="min-height:1.5em"><strong>Technical Skills</strong></p><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Backend Development: Python (we use Python 3), strong understanding of web frameworks and APIs</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Database Design: Experience with NoSQL and SQL databases</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Cloud Infrastructure: Google Cloud Platform, or similar cloud platforms</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Architecture Patterns: Domain-driven design, clean architecture, CQRS</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">System Design: Ability to design systems that balance performance, maintainability, and business requirements</p></li></ul><p style="min-height:1.5em"><strong>Preferred Experience</strong></p><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Financial Systems: Payment processing, fraud detection, or compliance systems</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Financial Regulations: Understanding of AML, KYC, PCI DSS, or similar regulations</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Banking Integrations: Experience with financial APIs and money movement systems</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">High-Scale Systems: Experience with systems processing high transaction volumes</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Third-Party Integrations: Experience coordinating multiple external service integrations</p></li></ul><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>Why This Role Matters</strong></h2><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Direct Impact: You'll be a big part of a small engineering team building systems that power a growing fintech platform</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Architecture Influence: Lead technical decisions that will scale with our business</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Complex Problems: Work on sophisticated challenges that few engineers get to solve</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Team Building: Establish engineering practices and culture from the ground up</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Financial Innovation: Build systems that enable new financial products and services</p></li></ul><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>What We Offer</strong></h2><ul style="min-height:1.5em"><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Competitive compensation with equity in a growing fintech company</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Remote-first culture with flexible working arrangements</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Small team, big impact - your work directly shapes our platform</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Professional growth - lead technical decisions and mentor team members</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Modern tech stack - work with cutting-edge cloud technologies</p></li><li><p style="min-height:1.5em">Mission-driven - build systems that power financial innovation</p></li></ul><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>Remote Work and Culture</strong></h2><p style="min-height:1.5em">Astra is a remote-first company hiring only within the U.S. We value thoughtful collaboration, clarity, and initiative. We’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer and are committed to building a diverse and inclusive team.</p><div style="min-height:1.2em;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0"> </div><h2><strong>How to Apply</strong></h2><p style="min-height:1.5em">We're looking for engineers who are excited by complex systems problems and have the educational background and experience to handle sophisticated challenges. If you're passionate about building mission-critical financial infrastructure and want to have a direct impact on our technical direction, we'd love to hear from you.</p>