Senior Backend Engineer (+ Equity) at Caplight

About the role

Join Caplight as a Senior Backend Engineer to architect the data infrastructure powering private market investing. You will design core systems, develop LLM-driven data pipelines, and build AI-native workflows that bring transparency to billions in live order volume, helping the world's leading institutional investors make high-stakes decisions with real-time intelligence.

Why this role is remarkable

• Build the "Bloomberg Terminal for private markets" for a cash-flow positive startup already handling billions in live order volume for top-tier institutional investors.
• High-ownership role working directly with the CTO to evolve a modular, event-driven architecture using modern AI tooling and advanced data pipelines.
• Join a fast-moving, 15-person team in San Francisco where your technical decisions will directly shape the execution infrastructure modern VC investing runs on.

What You Will Do

• Design and own core backend systems and APIs that ingest, structure, and enrich fragmented data using LLM-powered pipelines.
• Build and maintain an MCP server to enable institutional clients to interact with private market data through AI-native workflows.
• Collaborate with the CTO on system design, evolving the architecture toward modular services that support institutional-grade speed and reliability.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of backend-focused experience, ideally at an early-stage startup, with deep proficiency in TypeScript or typed functional languages like Rust or Haskell.
• Proven track record of shipping production-grade systems and contributing to high-level architectural decisions rather than just implementing feature specs.
• Local to the San Francisco Bay Area and excited to work in a high-velocity, in-person environment at least 3 days per week.