Senior Fullstack Software Engineer, Startpage

Senior Full Stack EngineerStartpage is a private search engine with roots going back to Ixquick in 1998, owned by System1 and competing with DuckDuckGo, Brave and Ecosia. We are expanding from search results into a broader set of consumer products for people who want privacy without giving up a modern experience.You will be a senior full stack engineer on the Startpage Consumer team, a small North America-based group where every engineer works with AI coding agents as a core part of the job. You know how to run agents in loops, coordinate multiple agents on one problem, and judge their output critically. The stack is mostly Python and JavaScript. You will own features from first commit to production across the web frontend, backend services and data pipeline, shape the architecture as the product grows, and pay down the tech debt that slows us. The team ships weekly, so your work reaches millions of monthly users within days.This position is an onsite role requiring you to work in our headquarters located at 4235 Redwood Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90066.What you'll work on:Expect to work across the full breadth of the product rather than one slice of it.New consumer products that extend Startpage beyond the search box, on desktop and on the webThe search results page itself: new features for subscribers and for everyone, within the constraints of our search partnershipsReal-time decisioning that shapes what a user sees for a given queryThe homepage and engagement features that bring people backTraffic quality and abuse prevention for a product that attracts automated trafficData instrumentation and reporting so the team can see what is workingResponsibilities:Design, build and ship features end to end, from API and data model through to the UIDrive your work with AI coding agents: give them the tools, context and guardrails they need, run them in loops against a spec, orchestrate several agents in parallel on one problem, and review what they produce with a critical eyeTurn interactive prototypes from product into production code, keeping the intent and cutting what does not hold upOwn services in production on Kubernetes: deploys, monitoring, the on-call rotation, and the latency and uptime targets a search product demandsShape architecture decisions and lead tech-debt reduction so the codebase stays fast to changeProtect user privacy in every design decision: no tracking, minimal data retention, and no third-party calls that leak queriesWrite automated tests as a matter of courseInstrument features and read your own results in Sigma and Snowflake; propose the next iteration from the dataWork with outside partners and agencies so web and app experiences stay consistentWrite clear tickets, PRs and design notes; review teammates' work the same dayRequirements:Daily, hands-on use of agentic coding tools: you can run agents in loops, write the evals that keep them honest, coordinate multi-agent workflows, and know when to take the keyboard back5+ years of professional web development, owning both frontend and backend in productionStrong Python, plus JavaScript or TypeScript, React, and modern CSS and HTMLHands-on with Docker, Kubernetes, Helm and RedisCI/CD and monitoring tooling, and AWS or a comparable cloud platform; comfortable being paged for what you shipSolid automated testing habitsSQL fluency and the habit of checking your own feature's numbers after launchCare for performance: you know what a 100 ms regression costs on a search results pageClear written communication with a distributed team and outside vendorsNice to have:Desktop browser or mobile app experience, especially Chromium, Electron or a shipped native appPrior search or privacy product experienceAds or recommendations systems, especially serving ML models at low latencyBot detection, fraud or abuse preventionSEO-driven site generation at scaleFamiliarity with EU privacy regulationHow we work:Small North America-based team, weekly releasesProduct work starts as a clickable prototype; engineers are expected to push back on it before buildingAgents do the typing; engineers own the architecture, the review and the outcomeData over opinion: every feature ships with instrumentation and a success metricJira for tracking, GitHub for code, Sigma and Snowflake for analytics, Slack for the day to dayWhat we have to offer:Competitive salary + bonus + equityGenerous PTO + 11 company holidaysOpen sick time100% covered Medical, Dental, Vision for employees401k with matchHealth & Dependent Care Flex Spending AccountPaid professional developmentLeadership & growth opportunitiesVirtual company and team building eventsThe U.S. base salary range for this full-time position is $133,000 - $183,000 + bonus + equity + benefits. 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