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Staff Full Stack Software Engineer - Back End

Denver, CO

About Urban Sky: 

Urban Sky is a venture-backed aerospace startup that pioneers utilization of the stratosphere and reimagines the way humans view and analyze the earth. We design, build, operate, and sell stratospheric balloon systems, and the data we collect supports a wide range of applications, from real-time wildfire monitoring to urban mapping. Our technology is also employed by government customers including the Department of Defense (DoD), NASA, and others. Urban Sky sends flight vehicles to the stratosphere on a weekly basis. 

Our team consists of engineers, makers, developers, and doers who believe in the power of human potential when passion meets utility within a small, supportive team. At Urban Sky we strive to create a team culture grounded in candor, inclusion, respect and empowerment. 

We aim to build the next chapter of stratospheric history in Denver and are seeking self-starting, open-minded, and hard-working team members. 

About The Role: 

Urban Sky is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to join our Engineering team in Denver, CO. In this role, you will be responsible for building high-quality, clean, scalable code. You will play a critical part in designing software and contributing to the design and implementation of new products and features while tackling complex technical challenges at the intersection of aerospace, real-time systems, and cloud infrastructure. 

 

This role requires deep expertise in cloud infrastructure and DevOps practices. 

You'll be working extensively with AWS, Terraform, Docker, CI/CD pipelines, and observability tools to build and maintain production systems that support mission-critical stratospheric balloon operations. 

 

What You'll Do 

 

Software Development 

  • Build new functionality and features for our platform 
  • Develop and extend APIs and SDKs 
  • Build integrations with 3rd party systems and services 
  • Design software that is simple to use and allows customers to extend and customize functionality 
  • Build high-quality, clean, scalable and reusable code by enforcing best practices around software engineering architecture and processes (code reviews, unit testing, etc.) 

Infrastructure & DevOps (Core Focus) 

  • Architect and manage cloud infrastructure using services for container orchestration, CDN, serverless computing, managed databases, object storage, load balancing, and more 
  • Write and maintain Infrastructure as Code using Terraform to manage all cloud resources declaratively 
  • Build and optimize Docker containers for our microservices architecture 
  • Design and improve CI/CD pipelines to automate testing, building, and deployment 
  • Implement comprehensive observability with logging, metrics, and distributed tracing across our systems 
  • Monitor and optimize system performance, costs, and reliability 
  • Scale infrastructure to support growing operational demands 
  • Own infrastructure deployments from design through production delivery 

Collaboration & Leadership 

  • Work with product owners and the team to understand detailed requirements and own your code from design through delivery 
  • Contribute to the design and implementation of new products and features while also enhancing the existing product suite 
  • Be a mentor for colleagues and help promote knowledge-sharing around infrastructure and development best practices 

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Types of Projects You'll Work On 

As a Staff Software Engineer, you'll tackle diverse technical challenges across our platform: 

Infrastructure & Networking 

  • Build and maintain secure internal infrastructure for real-time communication between ground-based systems and aerial platforms 
  • Design robust packet routing and message delivery systems for satellite communications 
  • Architect deployment solutions that can operate with varying levels of cloud connectivity, supporting diverse operational environments 

Scaling & Performance 

  • Scale backend systems to handle simultaneous operations across multiple aerial platforms and ground stations 
  • Build distributed systems capable of processing high-frequency telemetry and command messages from concurrent missions 
  • Enhance simulation platforms to support increasing operational complexity and concurrent users 

Real-Time Data Processing 

  • Develop and scale cloud-based image processing services for real-time aerial imagery 
  • Build and maintain data visualization systems for mission planning and operational awareness 
  • Design robust systems for storage, indexing, and exploration of large-scale mission data and derived products 

Security & Access Control 

  • Design and implement comprehensive role-based access control across multiple services and interfaces 
  • Ensure systems meet government and defense security standards 
  • Implement security best practices across the technology stack 

 

DevOps & Release Engineering 

  • Architect and maintain cloud infrastructure using Infrastructure as Code (Terraform) 
  • Build and maintain automated CI/CD pipelines for deployment and testing 
  • Design comprehensive observability with logging, metrics, dashboards, and alerting 
  • Implement security best practices including WAF, secrets management, IAM policies, and vulnerability scanning 
  • Manage multi-environment deployments with automated rollbacks and safe deployment strategies 
  • Optimize system performance, reliability, and costs 

 

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Required Skills & Experience 

 

Core Experience 

  • 8+ years of experience as a software engineer 
  • 6+ years of experience with JavaScript and web development, frontend and backend 
  • Excellent teamwork and communication skills 
  • Excellent engineering skills and strong computer science fundamentals 
  • Contributions to large software projects as a member of a broader team 
  • Strong analytical and design skills 

Backend & Infrastructure 

  • Hands-on experience with microservices architecture, message queues, gRPC, and protobufs 
  • Experience developing and scaling backend web systems and APIs 
  • Experience managing databases, particularly PostgreSQL 
  • Strong understanding of distributed systems, data structures, algorithms, and design patterns 
  • Experience with performance optimization and scale considerations 
  • Understanding of network programming, packet routing, and real-time communication systems 

Frontend Development 

  • Love writing TypeScript 
  • Experience with modern UI frameworks like Angular, React, or Vue 
  • Passion for JavaScript and the Web as a platform, reusability, and componentization 
  • Experience building complex React frontends with real-time data visualization 
  • Comfortable with WebSocket programming for real-time applications 

Cloud & DevOps (Critical Requirements) 

  • Deep, hands-on AWS experience with ECS, CloudFront, Lambda, RDS, S3, ALB/NLB, VPC networking, IAM, and CloudWatch 
  • Expert-level Terraform experience managing complex infrastructure as code, modules, and state management 
  • Production Docker experience with multi-stage builds, optimization, security scanning, and container networking 
  • CI/CD pipeline development experience with GitHub Actions or similar (Jenkins, GitLab CI, CircleCI) 
  • Observability and monitoring experience with logging, metrics, dashboards, distributed tracing, and alerting systems 

 

AI-Assisted Development (Required) 

  • We strongly emphasize proficiency with AI-assisted development tools and methodologies. The ideal candidate should: 
  • Demonstrate strong ability to build, test, and debug using both traditional engineering skills and AI tools 
  • Be comfortable switching between different AI models (GPT-4, Claude, etc.) and selecting the right tool for each task 
  • Understand how to utilize AI to build production systems, not just prototypes 
  • Know how to leverage AI to automate development tasks and improve productivity 
  • Be able to critically evaluate AI-generated code and apply sound engineering judgment 
  • Have experience participating in technical challenges that combine both AI-assisted and traditional problem-solving approaches 

 

Note: Our technical interview process includes a mix of AI-assisted and non-AI challenges to evaluate your skills in both domains. 

 

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Nice-to-Haves 

Technical Skills 

  • Experience with mesh VPN or zero-trust networking solutions 
  • Experience with satellite communication systems 
  • Knowledge of image processing pipelines and computer vision systems 
  • Experience with geospatial data and visualization systems 
  • Experience with time-series databases 
  • Understanding of IoT device communication protocols and edge computing 

 

Industry Experience 

  • Experience in a peak performance organization, preferably a tech startup or aerospace company 
  • Experience working with a remote or hybrid team 
  • Experience working with products that integrate with government or military systems 
  • Understanding of compliance requirements (FedRAMP, ITAR, security clearances) 
  • Experience building mission-critical systems with high reliability requirements 
  • Background in aerospace, defense, or real-time monitoring systems 

Requirements: 

  • Must be US Citizen or Permanent Resident 
  • Open to remote for the right candidate, otherwise must be in Denver, CO 

 

Benefits: 

  • Salary $170,000 - $200,000 per year  
  • We are required to post this salary range per Colorado law. Your salary will be determined based on your abilities and experience. 
  • Stock Options 
  • Medical, Vision and Dental 
  • Unlimited Vacation Days 
  • Cell Phone Bill Stipend 

Urban Sky is required to post this salary range per Colorado law. Your salary will be determined based on your abilities and experience. 

Colorado Pay Transparency

$170,000 - $200,000 USD

We expect all team members to actively leverage and continuously adapt to emerging AI tools as a core part of their daily workflow. Proficiency with job-relevant modern AI tools (e.g., ChatGPT, Claude, GitHub Copilot) is expected and integral to success in this role.

NOTE: Research suggests that women and BIPOC individuals may self-select out of opportunities if they don’t meet 100% of the job requirements. We encourage anyone who believes that they have the skills and the passion necessary to succeed here to apply for this role. 

This position may require the candidate to deal with commodities, software, technology, defense articles, and/or technical data which are subject to the Export Administration Regulations and/or the International Traffic in Arms Regulations. Additional information may be requested so as to determine whether export authorization is required from the Bureau of Industry and Security and/or the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls. If authorization is required, employment will be contingent upon the Company successfully obtaining such authorization from the relevant government agency. 

Urban Sky is an equal opportunity employer, and we value diversity. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, merit, and business need.

 

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