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Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai

NEW
Location
Bengaluru East, Karnataka, India
Job type
Full time
Posted 1 day ago
Description

Ambient.ai is the category creator and leader in Agentic Physical Security. Powered by Ambient Pulsar, the first reasoning Vision-Language Model purpose-built for physical security, our platform seamlessly integrates with existing security cameras and physical access control systems to unify monitoring, access control, threat assessment, response, and investigations through an always-on reasoning layer that augments security operators with superhuman capabilities. The results: 95% fewer false alarms, investigations 20x faster, and 10x faster response.


The momentum speaks for itself: we doubled new ARR in FY26, and have delivered results for world-class customers including Cisco, ServiceNow, SentinelOne, TikTok, Bayer, and MoMA. That kind of momentum creates an environment where great people thrive, and it shows: we recently ranked #71 out of 500 on the Forbes best startup employers list.


Founded in 2017 and backed by Andreessen Horowitz, Y Combinator, and Allegion Ventures, Ambient.ai is on a fast-paced journey to fulfill our mission: prevent every security incident possible.


About The Role


We’re looking for a Senior Software Engineer, Backend who will play a key role in designing, developing, and scaling our data stores and caching systems to petabyte scale. You will be responsible for ensuring the availability, reliability, and performance of our data stores, contributing to the success of our mission-critical applications. Additionally, you will have the opportunity to work with retrieval-augmented generation systems.


What You’ll Do


  • You will lead the design, development, and scaling of our data storage and caching systems to petabyte scale while also spearheading the development of advanced retrieval-augmented generation systems.
  • Develop highly efficient caching systems that obliterate latency, ensuring lightning-fast data access.
  • Tackle data infrastructure challenges head-on, swiftly troubleshooting and resolving issues to minimize downtime.
  • Lead groundbreaking efforts in retrieval-augmented generation systems, pushing the boundaries of what's possible


What You’ll Bring


  • At least 5+ years of experience building scalable web services.
  • A robust background in software engineering with a demonstrated specialization in architecting and optimizing data infrastructure at scale.
  • A track record of successfully architecting and scaling data stores to accommodate petabyte-level data volumes
  • Profound competence in designing and implementing caching systems to optimize data access latency.
  • Hands-on proficiency in scaling, managing, and fine-tuning database systems, encompassing MySQL, PostgreSQL, Redis, and OpenSearch
  • Expertise in programming languages, especially Python/C++, and sound knowledge of software development best practices.
  • Experience with distributed data processing frameworks and a profound comprehension of diverse database management systems.
  • Familiarity with retrieval-augmented generation systems and their application in data workflows.
  • Exceptional problem-solving abilities and a proven aptitude for collaborative problem resolution in a team environment.


Why Join Us


  • We are creating an entirely new category within a 120+ billion-dollar physical security industry and looking for team members who are also passionate about our mission to prevent every security incident possible
  • We have an impressive customer roster of F500 companies, including Adobe, SentinelOne, and TikTok
  • Regular Full-time employees receive stock options for the opportunity to share ownership in the success of our company
  • We provide a comprehensive health package.
  • We offer flexible time off to rest and recharge, including Winter Break (time off between Christmas and New Year’s for most roles, depending on customer demand)
  • You’ll receive everything you need to hit the ground running, including cutting-edge equipment and branded gear
  • Enjoy a full range of opportunities to connect with your awesome co-workers
  • We love to hike, are foodies, and love music! Check out our most recent A


Ambient.ai
ambient.ai
101-500

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Frequently Asked Questions

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Why work at Ambient.ai?

A Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai can appeal to engineers who want to apply backend expertise to products at the intersection of software, artificial intelligence, and real-world security. Ambient.ai is associated with AI-powered physical security solutions, a domain where dependable software can help organizations make sense of complex information and support timely decisions. For backend engineers, that creates an opportunity to think beyond individual services and consider how data, APIs, and distributed systems contribute to a broader product experience.

The role is based in Bengaluru East, Karnataka, India, and is listed as a full-time position in the Engineering department. Senior backend work typically involves shaping systems as well as implementing them: evaluating design choices, considering reliability and scale, and helping a team maintain code that can evolve over time. Candidates who enjoy balancing practical delivery with thoughtful technical decisions may find this kind of opportunity especially engaging.

Working on products that use AI can also bring interesting engineering challenges. Backend systems may need to support data-intensive workflows, integrate with other services, and make information available consistently and securely. The exact responsibilities for this opening should be confirmed in the official job description, but engineers considering the position can prepare to discuss how they have built robust services, handled production complexity, and collaborated across technical disciplines.

Ambient.ai may be worth exploring if you are looking for a role where backend engineering is connected to a concrete product domain rather than treated as an isolated infrastructure function. Before applying, review the company’s current product information and the complete listing to understand its technology, team expectations, and the scope of the position.

What’s it like to work at Ambient.ai?

The day-to-day experience at Ambient.ai will depend on the team, project, and current business priorities. The available job information identifies this opening as a full-time Engineering role in Bengaluru East, but it does not specify team structure, working arrangements, benefits, or company culture. Candidates should use the interview process to ask how the team collaborates, makes technical decisions, and supports engineers’ growth.

For someone evaluating Ambient.ai, it can be useful to think about the environment suggested by the company’s product area. Software for security-related use cases needs to be dependable and understandable to the people who rely on it. Teams working in this space may need to consider how services behave under changing conditions, how systems communicate useful information, and how product functionality fits into customers’ real-world operations. These are valuable topics to investigate rather than assumptions to make about the company’s internal practices.

A prospective employee can learn more by asking practical questions, such as:

  • How are backend engineering projects scoped and prioritized?
  • Which teams or disciplines does backend engineering work with most often?
  • What does the team consider a successful first three or six months?
  • How are reliability, performance, and maintainability evaluated?
  • What opportunities are available to influence system design?
  • How does the team share operational knowledge and learn from incidents?

These questions can help you determine whether the role matches your preferred working style. They also show that you are considering the whole engineering environment—not only the tools or programming language a team might use. When researching Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai, consult the official listing and ask the recruiter to clarify any details that are not publicly available.

What’s it like to work as a Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai?

A Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai would be expected to bring substantial backend engineering experience and the judgment to work through complex technical problems. The listing does not provide a detailed responsibility breakdown or a required number of years of experience, so candidates should confirm the precise expectations with the hiring team. In general, senior backend positions combine hands-on development with system-level thinking and collaboration.

The work may involve designing or improving backend services, developing APIs, and making sure that data flows reliably between components. Depending on the team’s architecture and product needs, relevant engineering concerns could include service boundaries, database design, latency, fault tolerance, observability, access controls, and deployment practices. These are common areas of backend engineering, not confirmed details of this particular opening.

The seniority of the role also suggests that communication and technical leadership may matter alongside coding ability. A senior engineer often needs to explain trade-offs, review designs, help teammates resolve difficult issues, and make incremental improvements without losing sight of longer-term system health. In a product environment involving AI, useful discussions may include how backend services support data-intensive workflows and how the system handles accuracy, availability, and changing requirements. Candidates should connect these topics to work they have actually done rather than assume a particular architecture at Ambient.ai.

To prepare, identify two or three projects that demonstrate the range of your experience. For each one, be ready to explain the original problem, your specific contribution, the design alternatives you considered, how you handled failure or scale, and what you learned after launch. Strong examples show not just that a system worked, but how you made decisions, collaborated with others, and improved the outcome.

Senior Software Engineer, Backend interview questions at Ambient.ai

The questions below are practice examples, not confirmed questions from Ambient.ai. The company’s interview process and topics may vary by team, role, and candidate. Use these prompts to prepare clear, evidence-based answers, and check with the recruiter about the format and stages of the interview.

Backend engineering and system design

  1. How would you design a backend service that needs to process a high volume of incoming events?
  2. How do you decide whether a capability should be implemented as a separate service or remain within an existing service?
  3. Describe how you would design an API that must remain reliable as its number of users or integrations grows.
  4. What trade-offs do you consider when choosing between synchronous and asynchronous processing?
  5. How have you handled schema changes while keeping dependent services compatible?
  6. What steps would you take to investigate rising latency in a production service?

Reliability, data, and operations

  1. Tell us about a production incident you helped resolve. What did you do, and what changed afterward?
  2. How do you make a backend system observable? Which logs, metrics, or traces have helped you most?
  3. How would you prevent duplicate processing in an event-driven workflow?
  4. What approaches have you used to protect sensitive data and control access to backend systems?
  5. How do you identify and address bottlenecks in a database-backed application?
  6. How do you balance fast delivery with maintainability and operational reliability?

Collaboration and senior-level judgment

  1. Describe a technical decision where you had to balance competing requirements.
  2. How do you approach a design review when you disagree with a proposal?
  3. Tell us about a time you helped another engineer or raised the quality of a team’s work.
  4. How do you break down a large, ambiguous project into deliverable steps?
  5. What do you do when product requirements change after implementation has started?
  6. How do you decide when to refactor existing code and when to leave it as it is?

When answering, be specific about your own role and the result. Where possible, use measurable outcomes—such as reduced processing time, fewer incidents, or improved service availability—but explain how those measurements were obtained. Avoid presenting estimates as exact results.

Senior Software Engineer, Backend interview preparation at Ambient.ai

Effective preparation for Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai starts with the official job listing. Review the complete description and note any stated technologies, responsibilities, or experience requirements. The information available for this page identifies the job as full-time, in Engineering, and located in Bengaluru East; it does not include a detailed technology stack or specific years-of-experience requirement. Do not assume a language or framework until it is confirmed by the employer.

Refresh core backend concepts that apply across technology stacks. Be comfortable discussing API design, data modeling, concurrency, caching, queues, service communication, error handling, and reliability. For system design, practise clarifying requirements before proposing an architecture. Cover expected traffic, data volume, consistency needs, failure scenarios, security, and operational monitoring. Explain the trade-offs behind your design instead of presenting one solution as universally correct.

Prepare coding practice that reflects the level of the role. Revisit common data structures and algorithms, but also practise writing readable, testable code and explaining your reasoning as you work. For senior positions, interviewers may be interested in how you handle edge cases, evaluate complexity, and adapt when requirements change—not only whether you reach an answer quickly.

Build a concise portfolio of examples from your experience. Select situations that demonstrate system design, production ownership, cross-team collaboration, technical decision-making, and learning from setbacks. Use a simple structure: describe the context, explain the challenge, state your actions, and summarize the result. Be clear about which decisions were yours and where you worked with a team.

Finally, prepare questions for the hiring team. Ask about the backend group’s responsibilities, current technical challenges, expectations for the role, and how success is measured. If the interview involves a particular system or product area, ask what context you should review beforehand. These conversations help you prepare accurately and assess whether the position fits your interests.

Senior Software Engineer, Backend interview tips at Ambient.ai

  • Confirm the interview format. Ask the recruiter whether the process includes coding, system design, behavioral conversations, or other assessments. The exact stages are not stated in the job details provided here.
  • Think aloud during technical exercises. Clarify requirements, explain your assumptions, and discuss alternatives before settling on a solution.
  • Connect answers to real experience. Use examples that show your personal contribution, the engineering choices involved, and the outcome.
  • Show senior-level judgment. Discuss trade-offs involving reliability, complexity, delivery speed, security, and long-term maintenance.
  • Be candid about unfamiliar tools. If a technology is new to you, explain the related concepts you do know and how you would get up to speed.
  • Prepare thoughtful questions. Ask about team priorities, collaboration, architecture, and what the company expects from a successful senior backend engineer.
  • Keep company-specific claims grounded. Research Ambient.ai through current official sources, and avoid assuming details about internal systems or culture that have not been shared.

A well-prepared candidate can present both technical depth and sound engineering judgment. For anyone pursuing Senior Software Engineer, Backend at Ambient.ai, the strongest preparation combines backend fundamentals, clear project examples, thoughtful questions, and a careful review of the latest official job information.