Senior Software Engineer
Senior Software Engineer
Full-Time Position | Portland, Oregon
About Us
Rapta is revolutionizing precision US manufacturing with an agentic native AI Platform trusted by the nation's top defense primes. Backed by top investors and growing 521% year-over-year, we're a Portland-based team building computer vision and robotics technology that keeps America's most critical production lines running flawlessly. If you want to do meaningful work at the intersection of AI and advanced manufacturing, we'd love to meet you.
Position Overview
We're seeking an experienced Senior Software Engineer to join our team in developing distributed, cutting-edge applied AI systems. This is a full-time position working directly with our engineering team to drive technical innovation and mentor mid-level and junior engineers.
What You'll Do
Contribute to the architecture and development of production-grade distributed microservice systems running on Linux
Drive technical initiatives to advance our service mesh, contract-first APIs, and inter-service communication patterns
Build scalable data processing pipelines and high-throughput service infrastructure
Design and evolve protobuf contracts and gRPC service definitions across the platform
Provide technical guidance to junior team members
What We're Looking For
10+ years of professional experience developing distributed backend systems on Linux
Deep curiosity for all software and systems architecture topics
Expert-level Python programming and software architecture skills
Strong system design skills with a focus on service boundaries, API contracts, and fault tolerance
Fluency operating in Linux environments — comfortable living in the shell, reading logs, and reasoning about process, network, and filesystem behavior
Excellence in technical communication and documentation
Required Technical Skills
Expertise in prompt engineering and AI-assisted development as a daily practice — Claude Code, Augment, Copilot, or equivalent is a force multiplier in your workflow, not a novelty
Expertise in designing and operating microservice architectures at scale
Deep experience with gRPC and Protocol Buffers — schema evolution, streaming RPCs, interceptors, and contract-first development
Proficiency with version control and CI/CD practices
Experience with containerized deployments (Docker on Linux hosts), service discovery, and distributed computing
Strong grasp of observability: distributed tracing, structured logging, and metrics
Highly Competitive Candidates Will Also Bring
Previous experience in manufacturing, industrial automation, or quality control systems
Experience with monorepo build systems (Bazel, Buck, Pants) and polyglot protobuf code generation
Familiarity with backwards/forwards compatibility patterns and API versioning at scale
Experience with real-time processing and edge computing constraints on resource-constrained Linux devices
Experience with configuration management and infrastructure-as-code (Ansible, Terraform) for Linux fleet operations
Why Join Us?
Work with cutting-edge technology in a high-impact industry
Meaningful early-stage equity at a late seed-stage company
Competitive compensation and benefits package
Professional development and learning opportunities
Opportunity to shape manufacturing technology that impacts American industry
Location Requirements
Candidates local to the Portland, Oregon metro area will be considered highly competitive for this role. While we will consider remote applicants on a case-by-case basis, local presence is strongly valued and may be a deciding factor.
Equal Opportunity
Rapta is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer, making decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, national origin, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected class.
How to Apply
No recruiters or agencies — we only accept applications directly from applicants.
Apply To This Job
Full-Time Position | Portland, Oregon
About Us
Rapta is revolutionizing precision US manufacturing with an agentic native AI Platform trusted by the nation's top defense primes. Backed by top investors and growing 521% year-over-year, we're a Portland-based team building computer vision and robotics technology that keeps America's most critical production lines running flawlessly. If you want to do meaningful work at the intersection of AI and advanced manufacturing, we'd love to meet you.
Position Overview
We're seeking an experienced Senior Software Engineer to join our team in developing distributed, cutting-edge applied AI systems. This is a full-time position working directly with our engineering team to drive technical innovation and mentor mid-level and junior engineers.
What You'll Do
Contribute to the architecture and development of production-grade distributed microservice systems running on Linux
Drive technical initiatives to advance our service mesh, contract-first APIs, and inter-service communication patterns
Build scalable data processing pipelines and high-throughput service infrastructure
Design and evolve protobuf contracts and gRPC service definitions across the platform
Provide technical guidance to junior team members
What We're Looking For
10+ years of professional experience developing distributed backend systems on Linux
Deep curiosity for all software and systems architecture topics
Expert-level Python programming and software architecture skills
Strong system design skills with a focus on service boundaries, API contracts, and fault tolerance
Fluency operating in Linux environments — comfortable living in the shell, reading logs, and reasoning about process, network, and filesystem behavior
Excellence in technical communication and documentation
Required Technical Skills
Expertise in prompt engineering and AI-assisted development as a daily practice — Claude Code, Augment, Copilot, or equivalent is a force multiplier in your workflow, not a novelty
Expertise in designing and operating microservice architectures at scale
Deep experience with gRPC and Protocol Buffers — schema evolution, streaming RPCs, interceptors, and contract-first development
Proficiency with version control and CI/CD practices
Experience with containerized deployments (Docker on Linux hosts), service discovery, and distributed computing
Strong grasp of observability: distributed tracing, structured logging, and metrics
Highly Competitive Candidates Will Also Bring
Previous experience in manufacturing, industrial automation, or quality control systems
Experience with monorepo build systems (Bazel, Buck, Pants) and polyglot protobuf code generation
Familiarity with backwards/forwards compatibility patterns and API versioning at scale
Experience with real-time processing and edge computing constraints on resource-constrained Linux devices
Experience with configuration management and infrastructure-as-code (Ansible, Terraform) for Linux fleet operations
Why Join Us?
Work with cutting-edge technology in a high-impact industry
Meaningful early-stage equity at a late seed-stage company
Competitive compensation and benefits package
Professional development and learning opportunities
Opportunity to shape manufacturing technology that impacts American industry
Location Requirements
Candidates local to the Portland, Oregon metro area will be considered highly competitive for this role. While we will consider remote applicants on a case-by-case basis, local presence is strongly valued and may be a deciding factor.
Equal Opportunity
Rapta is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer, making decisions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, national origin, age, veteran status, disability, or any other protected class.
How to Apply
No recruiters or agencies — we only accept applications directly from applicants.
Apply To This Job