Lead Platform Engineer, Stream
+ Equity for Netherlands-based employees
API for scalable chat services
Open for applications
API for scalable chat services
201-500 employees
Open for applications
+ Equity for Netherlands-based employees
201-500 employees
Company mission
To empower developers with the flexibility and scalability they need to easily build rich conversations and engaging communities.
Role
Who you are
- Software engineering background — you built things, not just configured them. Backend or platform coding experience in Go or Python (not scripting-only)
- Strong AWS or GCP depth — Experience with cloud cost optimization at scale with measurable outcomes
- Deep large scale Postgres knowledge (ex. experience with sharding, not just table partitioning)
- Kubernetes experience at meaningful production scale
- Hands-on leadership — you can lead a project and a PR in the same week. Comfortable in a team of 3–5, not dependent on large-org support structures
- AI tooling fluency — you use AI tools actively in your engineering workflow. We screen for applied adoption, not familiarity. If you're not convinced AI is useful, this isn't the right fit
Desirable
- Cloud migration experience (ideally AWS-> GCP) — moving workloads between providers or re-architecting for cost/performance
- Open source contributions to infra or platform tooling
- Engineering blog or conference talks on cloud, platform, or distributed systems topics
- Prior experience at an API-first or infrastructure-enabling scaleup
What the job involves
- We're looking for a hands-on Lead Engineer to own Platform and Infrastructure at Stream
- You'll work directly with a small, senior team and will be responsible for improving the efficiency, reliability, and cost profile of the systems powering Stream's entire real-time platform
- This is not an architecture-at-a-distance role. You will write code most of the time, lead infrastructure decisions across teams, and shape how we operate at scale
- Our platform works — but we're growing fast and there's meaningful work ahead on cost optimization, cloud efficiency, and platform scalability
- The team needs a strong engineering leader who comes from a software engineering background, can own technical decisions independently, and can make infrastructure move faster without introducing big-org process dependencies
- Your first 6 months will focus on three areas:
- Cloud migration (we're moving from AWS to GCP), with reservations
- Setting up Kubernetes, modernising our stack
- Moving 35-40 Postgres shards from AWS RDS to self-hosted on Kubernetes
- Beyond that, you'll shape long-term platform direction, define engineering standards, and collaborate with product and SDK engineers to keep the developer platform fast to build on
- Core Technologies
- Go
- AWS
- GCP
- Kubernetes
- PostgreSQL
- CockroachDB
- Redis
- Terraform
- Prometheus / observability stack
Our take
Every day, people all over the world communicate via in-app chats. However, chat and UX tools can take months to build and years to perfect. Stream solves this problem by allowing developers to build chat and activity streams into apps quickly and without hassle.
Having started out building APIs for activity feeds, Stream quickly moved into the lucrative chat market. Its customers now include household names such as Unilever, NBC Sports and TaskRabbit. Stream has seen funding from both big-name firms and startup CEOs - a clear indication of the company's broad appeal.
The company has lately been focussed on further developing its in-house technology, in order to fuel its continued growth in the coming years. It continues to enrich its Activity Feed, Chat SDK and AI-based Moderation products, as well as developing Live Video capabilities, which it states clients have been interested in for some time.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
11% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 5 rounds)
Mar 2021
$38m
SERIES B
Aug 2020
$15m
SERIES A
Total funding: $58.2m
Company benefits
- Equipment & Resources: Computers, standing desks, headphones, and other specialized tools are available for you to be successful
- Paid Vacation: Generous time off on top of observing several national holidays
- Stock Options: You get a piece of ownership in Stream. Stock options are granted to all full-time employees
- Health Coverage: We offer comprehensive healthcare, dental, and vision plans, plus generous parental leave (US only)
- Outings and parties: We like to have fun together! Team outings and parties are regular events around here
- Team Lunch and Snacks: Stream provides in-office daily team lunches and a stocked kitchen with tasty snacks and craft coffee
- 401k: Plan for your retirement through the company offered 401k (US only) or the local pension scheme in Amsterdam, to which Stream will make a contribution
- Commuter Benefits: Employees receive free Office parking and transportation benefits
- Monthly fitness stipend: We value the health and well being of our employees
Company HQ
Whittier, Boulder, CO
Leadership
Thierry Schellenbach
(Co-Founder & CEO)Previously co-founded Fashiolisa.com where they served as CTO for almost 7 years.
Tommasso Barbugli
(Co-Founder & CTO)Previously worked as a Python/Django Web Developer at Think Wize, and was Lead Engineer at Fashiolista.com.
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