Staff Software Engineer, Anaconda

• 10+ years of professional software development experience with demonstrated technical leadership on production systems serving large user bases
• Proven track record of setting technical direction for complex projects, making architectural decisions under uncertainty, and delivering results through both hands-on contribution and technical leadership
• Deep experience building developer tools, IDE extensions, or similar productivity software with 100K+ users, including performance optimization and scale considerations
• Expertise in TypeScript and modern JavaScript including asynchronous patterns, event-driven architectures, and Node.js runtime optimization
• Track record of performance optimization work at scale including profiling, instrumentation, and measurable improvements in startup time, memory usage, or throughput
• Experience working with AI-assisted coding tools, chat interfaces, or agent-based development workflows, including context window management and LLM integration patterns
• Demonstrated ability to influence technical decisions across teams, mentor other engineers, and elevate engineering practices through code review, documentation, or tooling
• Strong product sense and ability to partner with non-engineering stakeholders to translate business needs into technical solutions and tradeoffs

Desirable

• We're looking for a Staff Software Engineer to lead the evolution of Kilo Code, our flagship VS Code extension with over 5 million downloads processing more than 10 trillion tokens per month. You'll join a 15-person engineering team (average 10+ years of experience) working on one of the most-used AI-assisted coding tools in the world
• You'll ship your first PR on day one and have hands-on ownership of high-impact features at the velocity we expect from everyone on this team. You'll set the technical direction that lets the team move faster on everything after, including performance optimization at scale, defining architectural patterns for advanced AI-assisted workflows, and elevating the team's engineering practices while maintaining the velocity and quality our users expect
• Set technical direction for performance optimization initiatives across startup time, memory footprint, and CLI communication, establishing patterns and instrumentation that the team can leverage
• Design, build, and ship advanced features including granular auto-approval rules, context optimization, and Smart Apply workflows, then extract the patterns so the team can reuse them
• Drive cross-team initiatives that span the extension, backend services, and AI infrastructure, translating business priorities into technical roadmaps and breaking down complex problems into shippable increments
• Mentor engineers on the team through code review, architectural discussions, and pairing sessions, raising the bar for code quality, testing practices, and performance rigor
• Own end-to-end delivery of high-impact features from technical design through production deployment, including rollout strategy, telemetry design, and post-launch iteration based on user feedback
• Establish engineering standards for AI coding workflows including context window optimization, token compression strategies, and chat interface patterns that serve 6T+ tokens per month
• Identify and prioritize technical debt and performance bottlenecks proactively, balancing feature velocity with long-term system health on a mature codebase serving millions
• Partner with Product and Design to shape roadmap priorities, advocating for technical feasibility and incremental delivery while representing engineering constraints and opportunities
• Your Impact Will Be Measured Through:
• Feature impact: user engagement and performance metrics for high-complexity features you own, including adoption rates, performance benchmarks, and production stability
• Delivery cadence: your first PR on day one, then a sustained pace of high-complexity features shipped to production, setting the tempo for the team
• Technical leverage: measurable improvements in team velocity, code quality, or system performance that compound over time through patterns, tooling, or mentorship you introduce
• Architectural decisions: adoption and success of technical approaches you champion, measured through feature reliability, performance gains, and team consensus
• Cross-functional influence: successful delivery of initiatives requiring coordination across Product, AI Services, and other engineering teams with clear outcomes and minimal friction

• The application deadline for this role is 11/2/2026; applicants will be reviewed on an ongoing basis until the role is filled
• Our hiring process is fast because the job is. We run four steps, not eight, and we won't leave you waiting a week between them or send a form rejection six weeks later. Here's what you should expect:
• A conversation with our Co-founder & VP Engineering to see if there's a fit worth pursuing
• A 25-minute technical with an engineer who does the work you'll do. You'll work on a real problem we solve together, live, not a puzzle designed to trip you up. Contrary to expectations - AI use is not allowed here. We want to see how you problem solve and think, not prompt and orchestrate
• A values interview with your potential manager
• A final meeting with our Co-founder to make sure both sides feel good about moving forward
• A paid trial, 3-5 days of real work for real pay, with a defined deliverable. You get to see how we actually operate before you commit; we get to see the same. It's the most honest signal available, and it goes both ways
• At the end of this process if all goes well, you'll receive a formal offer to join Anaconda & the Kilo team and would start on our next available in-person onboarding in Austin, TX