Director, Data and Knowledge Platform Engineering

Role Summary

We’re hiring a Director, Data and Knowledge Platform Engineering (based in San Francisco) to own the architecture, delivery, and adoption of a governed, reusable Data → Knowledge → Skills stack that powers analytics, AI agents, and real-time decisioning across the company. This is a product-facing platform leadership role.

About Airwallex

Airwallex is the only unified payments and financial platform for global businesses. Powered by our unique combination of proprietary infrastructure and software, we empower over 200,000 businesses worldwide – including Brex, Rippling, Navan, Qantas, SHEIN, and many more – with fully integrated solutions to manage everything from business accounts, payments, spend management, and treasury, to embedded finance at a global scale. Airwallex has established dual HQs in San Francisco, CA, and Singapore, and recently crossed the US$1B ARR threshold. We were founded in Melbourne and, in our 10th year, we have a team of over 2,000 of the brightest and most innovative people in technology across 26 offices worldwide. Valued at US$8 billion and backed by world-leading investors including T. Rowe Price, Activant, Lingotto, Robinhood Ventures, TIAA Ventures, Visa, Airtree, Blackbird, Sequoia, DST Global, Greenoaks, Salesforce Ventures, Lone Pine, and Square Peg, Airwallex is leading the charge in building the global payments and financial platform of the future.

Ideal Experience

• 15+ years in data or platform engineering, with 5+ years leading engineering teams in complex, multi-region environments
• Proven experience architecting and scaling modern data platforms that extend beyond storage to include semantic layers, metadata systems, or knowledge graphs
• Strong hands-on expertise in data modeling (transactional, event-driven, dimensional, feature tables) with robust data quality, lineage, and observability practices
• Experience designing and operationalizing a governed semantic layer with standardized, auditable business metric definitions
• Track record of building reusable, programmatic capabilities on top of data platforms (APIs, orchestration frameworks, analytical workflows, agent-callable tools)
• Deep familiarity with modern lakehouse architectures, particularly within a Databricks environment
• Experience implementing regional data localization and residency strategies while maintaining a unified global data model
• Strong understanding of data governance, privacy, and regulatory controls in multi-jurisdictional contexts
• Platform-as-product mindset, with experience driving adoption, improving developer experience, and operating with clear SLAs/SLOs and measurable impact

Compensation Range

$300K - $330K