Research Engineer / Software Engineer (platform/core infrastructure) in Alton

About XBOW
Build the future of offensive security with XBOW. Attackers are already using AI to move faster than defenders can react—we’re creating the platform that puts security ahead in the arms race. Our AI‑powered system autonomously discovers, validates, and even exploits vulnerabilities, giving organizations proof‑backed results in hours instead of weeks.

Founded by Oege de Moor, creator of GitHub Copilot, and backed by Sequoia, Altimeter, and other leading investors, XBOW is applying cutting‑edge AI to one of the world’s most urgent problems. In just over a year, our AI, built by a world‑class AI team and legendary security researchers, has uncovered thousands of real‑world zero‑days across the software billions rely on, and achieved the #1 ranking on HackerOne’s global leaderboard.

We’re a team of builders, hackers, and researchers who thrive on solving problems others think are impossible. If you want to push the boundaries of AI, reshape how security is done, and join the group defining this new era of defense — we’d love to talk.

Your Role
We’re looking for a Platform Infrastructure Research Engineer who’s passionate about building scalable systems and solving hard problems in ambiguous environments. In this role, you’ll design and implement the complex distributed infrastructure that powers our core AI engine and distributed analysis systems, enabling XBOW to run seamlessly across multiple cloud providers (AWS, Azure, OCI etc.) and contexts (SaaS, on prem).

This is a role for someone who sees infrastructure as a product, loves clean abstractions, and knows how to dig into performance issues across layers. You’ll join a high‑trust, high‑velocity team where your work will have an immediate impact on both developer experience and product performance. If you like being at the intersection of deep tech and real‑world impact, you’ll feel right at home.

What You Will Do

• Design and implement infrastructure systems that scale reliably and securely, and can be deployed across multiple cloud environments (AWS, Azure, OCI etc.) and contexts (SaaS, on prem).
• Tune and optimize cloud services across compute, storage, networking, and observability to drive performance, reliability and maintainability of core services.
• Develop our core services, written in TypeScript, Kotlin and Go (and pick them up quickly if you haven’t used them before) to support our unique deployment and infrastructure requirements.
• Support large‑scale systems with event‑driven architectures.
• Own problems end‑to‑end—from design through deployment to production support.
• Navigate ambiguity and help define how we build as much as what we build.
• Partner closely with other engineers, AI researchers and security researchers to enable high‑quality, high‑velocity product development.
• Design for resilience by implementing disaster recovery and business continuity strategies that ensure uptime, even when things break.
• Improve how we build, deploy, and monitor services at scale.

Essential Skills and Qualifications

• Strong experience building and operating scalable, distributed systems on cloud infrastructure such as AWS or similar.
• Comfortable working with infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, CDK) and seeing infra as part of the engineering system—not something separate from it.
• A track record of performance tuning across cloud services, databases, and compute layers.
• Eager to learn new tools, languages, and technologies as needed.
• A thoughtful communicator who values clarity and simplicity and is comfortable working in a fast‑paced startup and navigating ambiguity.
• Strong problem‑solving skills and the ability to work with incomplete information.
• Curious, practical, and eager to work across layers of the stack when needed.
• You think proactively about failure modes and bring experience implementing disaster recovery and business continuity plans that keep critical systems running.

Advantageous

• Experience with deploying infrastructure to multiple environments (SaaS, on‑prem) and knowing how to build resilient systems that handle the complexity of such environments.
• Experience with event‑driven architectures, message queues, or async workflows (for example, using Kafka).
• Familiarity with modern observability practices (logs, metrics, tracing) and how to apply them.
• Experience working in an early‑stage startup.
• Prior experience building developer tooling or security products.
• Hands‑on experience with OpenSearch or Elasticsearch at scale.
• Previous experience building platform teams or working on internal developer platforms.

What We Offer

• Compensation & Equity: Competitive salary and a generous equity package, making you a true owner of the company.
• Career Growth: Shape your role, lead the function, and grow with the company as we redefine cybersecurity.
• Meaningful Work: You will tackle technically complex challenges and play a pivotal role in the growth of our business, working alongside an amazing team and some of the world’s experts to shape how AI transforms cybersecurity.

What Else You Should Know

• Location: Remote (all team members are remote but we meet regularly and you’re supported to travel to collaborate with colleagues in person).
• Contract: Full‑time.
• Hiring Process: 45‑min introductory chat with our Head of Talent, Zac Wallis. 45 minutes with our Head of Engineering, Andy Rice. 2‑3 hour pair programming session with two members from the team. 30‑min final meeting with our CEO and founder, Oege de Moor.

We aren’t focused on seniority titles at XBOW—so if you’re worried about “leveling,” don’t be. We care a lot more about mission fit, capability, and impact than what’s on your LinkedIn headline. We believe in people who are driven by curiosity and a willingness to learn. Even if you don’t check every box, we encourage you to apply if you’re excited about the role and our mission.