---
title: 'Search Engineer at Xero'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/search-engineer-xero-melbourne-v4fjyy25nn54'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-11-07'
---

# Search Engineer at Xero

- **Company:** [Xero](https://feeny.ai/companies/xero)
- **Location:** Melbourne, Australia
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** hybrid
- **Posted:** 2026-10-08
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-11-07
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/xero/9eef7111-d180-4e9e-a3df-f5f36f8b61f8

## Job description

Engineer, Search

## The role & impact

As an Engineer on our Search team, you’ll own the infrastructure, CI/CD and data pipelines that keep one of the largest search clusters in the southern hemisphere healthy and growing. You’ll design and run the infrastructure automation and Terraform that underpin the cluster, build pipelines that move and index data at scale, and keep the platform fast, resilient and cost effective as demand grows. You’ll Go Bold by leading design decisions on scaling, reliability and capacity for a system holding hundreds of terabytes. In your first 90 days, you’ll get up to speed on the cluster, the team and our platform rebuild, then start reviewing pull requests and making your first meaningful changes. Within 12 months, you’ll Go Further by owning a major project, contributing across both search and generalist work, and helping to shape how the team works. The team & how they connect Our Search team looks after one of the largest search clusters in the southern hemisphere, indexing more than 50 million documents a day, for around 200,000 daily active users at 99.9% uptime. We’re rebuilding and expanding the platform for Xero’s next stage of growth, working closely with the streaming data team, our product manager and Catalyst to plan and release changes safely. We’re remote-first across Melbourne, New South Wales and New Zealand, and we get together in Melbourne roughly every six months. The team is currently working on

- Tech stack: Github Actions and Terraform for infrastructure as code, with large-scale data pipelines feeding our search indexes.
- Current project: Rebuilding and expanding the search platform, including ingestion for our new platform alongside the streaming data team.
- Current project: Keeping the cluster highly available, owning monitoring, alerting and incident response to protect our 99.9% uptime.
- Future project: Owning and shaping a major platform project within your first year, spanning both search and generalist work.

Where and how you can work This is a permanent, remote-first role across Melbourne, New South Wales and New Zealand, so you can work from wherever you’re based. We get together in Melbourne roughly every six months, giving you time to connect with the team in person. Here are some of the things we are looking for

- You bring your experience running production infrastructure in the cloud, with hands-on skills in Github Actions and Terraform.
- You’ve designed and operated infrastructure pipelines that support complex platform scale environments and know how to keep them reliable under heavy demand.
- Solid software engineering skills and a high-quality mindset sit at the heart of how you work.
- Search or information retrieval experience, or a clear path to applying it, will help you hit the ground running.
- You communicate clearly, work well across remote teams and can explain trade-offs to people outside engineering.

Apply even if your experience isn’t a perfect match! At Xero, we hire based on your skills, passion, and the unique perspective you can bring to enhance our culture and team.

## About Xero

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Xero provides cloud-based accounting and financial management software for small businesses, serving over 4.9 million customers worldwide.
- **Entity Type**: Public (ASX: XRO, S&P/ASX 200 component)
- **Headquarters**: Wellington, New Zealand
- **Founded**: July 6, 2006
- **Founders**: Rod Drury, Hamish Edwards

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Cloud accounting software (SaaS)
- **Target customers**: Small businesses, accountants, and bookkeepers (B2B)
- **Mission**: To make life better for small businesses globally by automating routine tasks and delivering actionable insights.

## Products & Services
- **Xero Accounting Software**: Cloud-based platform for invoicing, bank reconciliation, expense tracking, payroll, and financial reporting. Sold by subscription (Starter, Standard, Premium tiers).
- **JAX – AI Finance Partner**: An AI-powered assistant integrated into Xero that automates routine tasks and provides insights to help businesses grow.
- **Xero Ecosystem**: Over 1,000 third-party app integrations via the Xero App Store, covering payments, inventory, CRM, and more.
- **Xero for Nonprofits**: Discounted subscriptions (25% off) for eligible nonprofit and community organisations.
- **Xero for Purpose**: Social impact initiatives including financial literacy programmes (Unlock Your Numbers), sustainability tools (Sumday carbon app), and the Xero Beautiful Business Fund (NZ$750,000+ in funding annually).

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed in provided sources (publicly traded with market cap available on ASX; latest data not included in search results).
- **Key Metric**: Annual Revenue NZ$2.103 billion (FY2025); Net income NZ$227.8 million (FY2025).
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Board Chair David Thodey; CEO Sukhinder Singh Cassidy. In June 2025, Xero announced an agreement to acquire Melio, a New York-based payments provider, for $2.5 billion.
- **Growth Signals**: Achieved Rule of 40 outcomes of 41.0% (May 2024) and 43.9% (Nov 2024). Customer base grew to 4.9 million. Headcount of 4,610 employees (2025). Expanding globally with offices in New Zealand, Australia, UK, US, Canada, South Africa, and Singapore.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Market leader** in cloud accounting across New Zealand, Australia, and the UK.
- **AI-first approach** with JAX, embedded directly into the core product to reduce manual work.
- **Extensive integration ecosystem** (1,000+ apps) creating high switching costs for customers.
- **Strong brand trust** built over 19 years with a focus on small business success.

## Strategic Focus
- **AI and automation**: Deepening AI capabilities (JAX) to deliver predictive insights and automate finance workflows.
- **Payments expansion**: Acquisition of Melio to strengthen payments capabilities for small businesses.
- **Sustainability**: Reducing carbon emissions (72% reduction in scope 1 & 2), offering free carbon accounting tools, and supporting small business sustainability.
- **Social impact**: Scaling programmes like the Beautiful Business Fund and financial literacy initiatives.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Values-driven, human-centric organisation with a focus on making a tangible impact on small businesses globally.
- **Flexibility**: Emphasises a flexible environment and time for what matters most (remote/hybrid policy not explicitly stated but implied).
- **Perks & benefits**:
  - One paid day off per year for volunteering (Community Connect programme).
  - Free access to Sumday carbon accounting app for employees.
  - Financial literacy resources and mentorship programmes.
- **Engineering & innovation**: Dedicated Engineering and Data & AI teams (open roles visible on careers page). Global collaboration across 7+ countries.
- **Diversity & inclusion**: Indigenous inclusion initiatives (te ao Māori in NZ, Reconciliation Action Plan in Australia), support for Indigenous communities.
- **Sustainability focus**: Employees can contribute to environmental goals through company-wide initiatives.

## Sources
1. [Wikipedia – Xero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xero)
2. [Xero About Page](https://www.xero.com/au/about/)
3. [Xero Careers – Inside Xero](https://careers.xero.com/inside-xero/)
4. [Xero Careers – Teams](https://careers.xero.com/)
5. [Xero Homepage](https://www.xero.com/)

## Other roles at Xero

- [Customer Experience Specialist - Melio](https://feeny.ai/job/customer-experience-specialist-melio-xero-manchester-0apnfjtyx359) — Manchester, United Kingdom
- [Engineering Manager - Cloud Networks](https://feeny.ai/job/engineering-manager-cloud-networks-xero-melbourne-8gqw69bv1r7w) — Melbourne, Australia
- [Lead Engineer - Front End (React)](https://feeny.ai/job/lead-engineer-front-end-react-xero-wellington-9sjxsd4a6d13) — Wellington, New Zealand
- [Senior Engineer - AI Platform](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-engineer-ai-platform-xero-melbourne-wy84yt8bba9z) — Melbourne, Australia
- [Financial Accountant](https://feeny.ai/job/financial-accountant-xero-wellington-0bjk26repmzk) — Wellington, New Zealand
- [Lead Engineer - Front End (React)](https://feeny.ai/job/lead-engineer-front-end-react-xero-melbourne-k9j5m5627ab0) — Melbourne, Australia
- [Accounting Professional? Discover a new career in SaaS Sales with Xero](https://feeny.ai/job/accounting-professional-discover-a-new-career-in-saas-sales-with-xero-xero-sd3m7hjzea5f) — Brisbane, Australia
- [Solutions Consultant](https://feeny.ai/job/solutions-consultant-xero-brisbane-rj5t374ksh02) — Brisbane, Australia
- [Engineer - Payments](https://feeny.ai/job/engineer-payments-xero-vancouver-v6a1s8dc9eqt) — Vancouver, Canada
- [Data Engineer - Performance Insights](https://feeny.ai/job/data-engineer-performance-insights-xero-sydney-ndt7sgmv8xdm) — Sydney, Australia