Backend Engineer - Ecomm

Location: Cary, NC (Onsite) | Duration: Contract | Pay Rate: $75-$80/hour | Openings: 3

About The Opportunity

We're seeking experienced Senior Backend Engineers to join a high-impact engineering team supporting large-scale content and data platforms. This role focuses on designing and building distributed backend systems that power content workflows, data orchestration, messaging systems, and service-to-service interactions at scale. The ideal candidate combines deep backend engineering expertise with a strong interest in utilizing AI-assisted development tools to accelerate delivery, improve test coverage, and enhance code quality. You'll work within a modern microservices ecosystem where reliability, scalability, and automation are critical.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain highly scalable backend services using Java and Spring.
• Build and support event-driven architectures handling large-scale data processing and service orchestration.
• Create and maintain complex workflow systems, state machines, and multi-service transactional processes.
• Develop backend services that aggregate, transform, and serve content and data to downstream applications and front-end experiences.
• Architect solutions for content management, approval workflows, moderation pipelines, and publishing systems.
• Integrate with systems of record and support data migration initiatives, legacy system modernization efforts, and ETL processes.
• Collaborate closely with front-end teams supporting React-based applications and content experiences.
• Improve engineering productivity through AI-assisted development tools and automation.
• Drive test-driven development practices and increase automated testing coverage.
• Monitor system health, troubleshoot production issues, and improve observability across services.

Requirements

• 7+ years of backend software engineering experience in large-scale distributed systems.
• Strong expertise with:
  • Java
  • Spring Framework / Spring Boot
  • AWS Cloud Services
  • MongoDB
  • PostgreSQL
• Deep experience designing:
  • Event-driven architectures
  • Message-based systems
  • State machines
  • Workflow orchestration platforms
  • Microservices architectures
• Hands-on experience with asynchronous processing and backend data orchestration.
• Strong understanding of distributed system design patterns and service-to-service communication.
• Experience working within modular monorepo environments.
• Experience developing CMS platforms, publishing systems, moderation workflows, or content approval pipelines.
• Proven success integrating backend systems with modern front-end applications.
• Strong knowledge of data migration strategies and ETL workflows.
• Experience implementing test automation and test-driven development practices.
• Excellent debugging, troubleshooting, and system design skills.

AI-Augmented Development Experience

Candidates should demonstrate practical experience incorporating AI tools into their software development workflow, including:

• Claude
• Cursor
• OpenAI tools
• GitHub Copilot or similar AI coding assistants

Ideal candidates leverage AI to:

• Accelerate development cycles
• Improve code quality
• Enhance testing coverage
• Optimize documentation
• Increase engineering efficiency

Observability & Reliability

Experience with monitoring and operational excellence tools such as:

• Grafana
• AWS CloudWatch
• New Relic
• Similar observability and monitoring platforms

Candidates should be comfortable diagnosing production issues, analyzing system performance, and identifying root causes across distributed environments.

Preferred Qualifications

• Gaming industry experience.
• Experience supporting large-scale content platforms.
• Background in recommendation engines, discovery systems, or personalization services.
• Experience supporting e-commerce content experiences from the backend.
• Familiarity with achievement systems, messaging buses, and high-volume event processing.
• Passion for engineering excellence, automation, and continuous improvement.

What Will Make You Successful

• Strong systems thinker who excels in designing scalable, maintainable architectures.
• Comfortable working across multiple services and complex data flows.
• Driven by quality, automation, and engineering best practices.
• Excited about leveraging AI as a force multiplier in software development.
• Collaborative communicator who can partner effectively across engineering, product, and platform teams.

Benefits

• Supplemental benefits, including medical, dental, vision, life, disability, and other insurance plans.
• Employee Stock Purchase Program (ESPP).
• 401K program with company match after 12 months of tenure.
• Health Savings Account (HSA) on the HDHP plan.
• SupportLinc Employee Assistance Program (EAP) with up to 8 free counseling sessions.
• Corporate discount savings program and other discounts.
• On-demand training program, access to certification prep, and a library of technical and leadership courses/books/seminars after 6+ months of tenure.
• Certification discounts and other perks to associations that include CompTIA and IIBA.
• Dedicated customer service team for consultants and a certified Career Coach.