Principal Engineer, Horizon3
Technical Lead
$213-273k
All full-time roles are eligible for an equity package in the form of stock options
More information about location
Autonomous security solutions
Be an early applicant
Autonomous security solutions
201-500 employees
Be an early applicant
$213-273k
All full-time roles are eligible for an equity package in the form of stock options
More information about location
201-500 employees
Company mission
To help find and fix attack vectors before attackers can exploit them.
Role
Who you are
- Deep expertise in software architecture, distributed or service-oriented systems, and the engineering tradeoffs involved in building durable, scalable products. We are at a critical inflection point and are investing heavily in building scalable systems for our continued growth
- Strong technical leadership experience as a senior individual contributor or technical lead, with a track record of leading through influence rather than formal management authority. We are a small team that is growing quickly and you will play a crucial role in our success
- Strong product judgment and the ability to translate business or customer needs into pragmatic technical decisions. If you only care about code, this may not be the right role for you
- Experience working across multiple projects or workstreams at the same time while maintaining clarity on priorities, risks, and execution sequencing. Like most jobs, there will be competing priorities, you’ll help set priorities and communicate tradeoffs
- Proven ability to work effectively with cross-functional partners including Product, Design, Security, peer engineering teams, and senior leadership
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain technical decisions and tradeoffs to non-technical stakeholders
- A history of mentoring engineers, elevating team performance, and improving engineering craft through design feedback, code reviews, and technical guidance
- Comfort operating in ambiguity and making sound decisions with incomplete information
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience
- 10+ years of professional software engineering experience
- Experience building backend services using at least one modern language, such as Python, Go, Java, TypeScript, or similar
- Experience working with SQL and at least one relational database in production
- Experience building backend services on a cloud platform (AWS, GCP, or Azure), and familiarity with Docker and containerized applications
- Required Tech Stack Experience:
- Backend development in one or more of: Go, Rust, Python, Java, or similar
- Designing and operating APIs, services, and asynchronous or event-driven systems
- Data modeling and persistence layers for product-grade backend systems
- Cloud-native application development and deployment patterns
- Observability, reliability, and operational best practices for production services
- Technical design documents, architectural proposals, and engineering standards that can be adopted by other teams
Desirable
- Experience with PostgreSQL and performance tuning for large datasets
- Experience with graph databases such as Neo4j or interest in learning them
- Experience building or consuming GraphQL backends
- Experience with ETL pipelines and data processing tools (e.g., Airflow-like frameworks, custom ETL jobs, or similar).
- Experience with observability stacks (e.g., Datadog, Prometheus, Grafana) and instrumentation of services
- Experience in cybersecurity, vulnerability management, security analytics, security data platforms, or adjacent domains
- Experience building products or platforms in vulnerability management, exposure management, security telemetry, or related cybersecurity domains
- Familiarity with risk scoring, prioritization systems, or data-intensive backend workflows
- Experience partnering closely with product managers to define and sequence an MVP without painting the team into a corner
- Experience helping define technical standards or practices adopted beyond your immediate team
- A track record of shaping technical direction more broadly across an organization, with influence extending beyond a single team or domain
What the job involves
- We are hiring a Principal Backend Engineer to serve as the Technical Lead
- You’ll be responsible for shaping the systems, architecture, and technical direction behind a product that helps customers understand and prioritize what matters most to secure their environments
- This role is for a senior individual contributor who leads through technical judgment, cross-functional partnership, and execution
- The right candidate will be equally comfortable translating ambiguous product goals into concrete technical roadmaps, writing production code (primarily backend but with an understanding for frontend as well), mentoring other engineers, and influencing decisions across multiple projects and partner teams
- Successful candidates will be product minded engineers with an obsession for the details and customer outcomes
- As a Principal engineer, you will help shape longer-term technical direction with broader company impact and influence beyond a single domain
- In the short-term this role will split time 50/50 between hands-on coding and architectural design
- Over time as the team grows, you’ll spend more of your time on design and unblocking the team as they work to deliver best in class experiences for our customers
- Own the end-to-end technical vision for the RBVM and its supporting services, from initial concept through implementation, iteration, and long-term evolution
- Partner with cross functional stakeholders to translate ambiguous product and business goals into concrete technical strategy, architecture, and execution plans for the RBVM team
- Contribute production code, setting the standard for design quality, code quality, and operational rigor
- Lead architectural decisions for scalable backend systems that balance velocity, reliability, maintainability, extensibility, and operability
- Drive execution across multiple concurrent projects and initiatives, identifying risks, dependencies, and tradeoffs early and helping the team sequence work effectively
- Partner closely with Product, Engineering leadership, Design, and adjacent engineering teams to deliver cross-functional initiatives and ensure technical decisions reflect both business context and customer needs
- Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences, including leadership stakeholders
- Set and continually raise the technical bar through architecture reviews, code reviews, technical writing, and strong engineering judgment under ambiguity
- Mentor and develop engineers on the team by providing thoughtful feedback, technical coaching, and frameworks that help others do the best work of their careers
- Support hiring by helping attract, interview, and calibrate strong engineering talent as the RBVM organization grows
Our take
In an era marked by escalating cyber threats and data breaches, safeguarding digital assets has become a high priority across all industries. Amid this landscape, Horizon3.ai stands out as an autonomous security solution by addressing the critical need for robust cybersecurity.
At the heart of Horizon3.ai's mission is NodeZero™, a platform designed to elevate proactive security measures. Using this, customers can verify their security posture and identify potential vulnerabilities through self-service. This proactive approach to cybersecurity effectively thwarts potential exploits and ensures the integrity of their digital infrastructure.
With 2025 funding in hand, the company is poised to further its ambition to develop into an industry-leading cybersecurity company. The infusion of funds will be channelled towards expanding its partner network, refining its offerings and entering the US government market. Horizon3 aims to establish itself as a pivotal player in the evolving autonomous security landscape, a highly lucrative market valued at $80 billion.
Kirsty
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
-8% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 6 rounds)
Jun 2025
$100m
SERIES D
Aug 2023
$40m
SERIES C
Total funding: $187m
Company benefits
- Growth Opportunities: Be part of a dynamic and growing team with numerous career advancement opportunities
- Innovation-Driven Culture: Work in a collaborative environment that encourages creativity and out-of-the-box thinking
- Flexible Work Environment: Enjoy the convenience and work-life balance that comes with remote work
- Inclusive and Diverse Team: We value diversity and promote an inclusive culture where everyone can thrive
Company HQ
SoMa, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Snehal Antani
(Co-Founder & CEO)Graduated from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute with an MS in Computer Science. Previously worked at IBM as a Lead Architect, at GE Capital as the CIO of Distribution Finance and Splunk as the SVP & GM of Business Analytics & IoT.
Anthony Pillitiere
(Co-Founder)Graduated from the University of Maryland with a Bachelor's Degree in Computer Systems Networking and Telecommunications. Previously worked at the United States Air Force in multiple roles, including Deputy Chief Technology Officer.
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