Senior Staff Software Engineer, Discord
Data and Machine Learning Platform
$256-279k
Plus equity
Voice, video and text communication platform
Job no longer available
Voice, video and text communication platform
1001+ employees
Job no longer available
$256-279k
Plus equity
1001+ employees
Company mission
To help friends and communities come together to hang out and explore their interests.
Role
Who you are
- 8+ years of experience in software development, with a focus on databases, data infrastructure, or machine learning platforms
- Proficiency with open source data/ml infrastructure projects and experience working with open source communities
- Proficiency in programming languages such as Python, Java, Rust, or similar
- Strong experience with big data technologies such as Hadoop, Spark, Kafka, and distributed computing frameworks
- Hands-on expertise with cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, or GCP
- Solid understanding of data modeling, database design, and SQL
- Experience with containerization (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes) and microservices architecture
- Proven ability to thrive in a fast-paced environment
- Strong experience communicating updates and resolutions to cross-functional partners and customers
Desirable
- A strong passion for Discord and gaming
- Significant contributions to popular and widely adopted open-source projects and technologies
- Experience in building a data or machine learning platform from scratch, or in transforming legacy solutions to a modern tech stack
What the job involves
- We are seeking an accomplished and experienced Senior Staff software Engineer to join our dynamic team
- As a leader of the Data and Machine Learning Platform team, you will be responsible for designing, developing, and maintaining our data and AIML infrastructure and services
- You will collaborate with cross-functional teams, including data scientists, software engineers, MLEs and product managers, to deliver modern and bleeding-edge solutions that drive business insights and innovation
- This role reports to our Director of Engineering, Data Platform
- Lead the design, implementation, and optimization of our data and machine learning platforms, ensuring scalability, reliability, and performance
- Develop and maintain data pipelines, ETL processes, and data models to support analytical and machine learning workflows
- Design and implement data storage solutions, including relational databases, data lakes, and distributed systems
- Collaborate with data scientists to deploy and operationalize machine learning models into production environments
- Build monitoring, logging, and alerting systems to ensure the health and performance of data services
- Promote and drive best practices in data governance, security, and compliance across the organization
- Mentor junior engineers, fostering a culture of continuous learning and growth
- Stay up-to-date with industry trends and emerging technologies in data platform and machine learning
Our take
Discord is an industry giant in the chat app space. The free platform has rapidly become one of the most popular services in the sector since being founded in 2015. It counts over 200M active users in 19M communities, successfully expanding beyond its original focus on video game players to become a broader social networking app and public forum.
Discord's userbase has grown rapidly as remote work has become the norm and a new generation of internet users has come online, attracted to its youthful presentation and plethora of gaming and social tools. It has since fended off takeover bids from Microsoft and interest from other giants such as Amazon and X, and has grown into a profitable company, funded by optional subscription fees and commissions from sales through the platform.
Discord’s remarkable growth, however, is not without obstacles. The company faces competition from deep-pocketed giants like Facebook, and regulatory concerns from those worried about the platform’s relatively light chat moderation. However, the company has the resources and expertise to adapt. For example, the acquisition of harassment detection software company Sentropy will go a long way towards placating the concerns of critics, as will the 2024 acquisition of teen app Gas used to give anonymous compliments to friends. All of these purchases are part of Discord's move to expand out of its mostly gaming-focused customer base.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
28% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 9 rounds)
Sep 2021
$500m
SERIES H
Dec 2020
$100m
SERIES H
Total funding: $979.3m
Company HQ
Potrero Hill, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Stanislav Vishnevskiy
(Co-Founder & CTO)Previously worked as a Software Engineer at Casamba and then Kabam. Also worked as a Lead Software Engineer at GREE International, and founded social network Guildwork.com in 2009.
Humam Sakhnini
(CEO)Humam joined the Discord team in 2025 as CEO. Prior to this, he was the VIce Chairman and Chief Strategy & Talent Officer at Activision Blizzard as well as the CFO/President at King. He also spent 8 years at McKinsey & Company as a Partner.
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