---
title: 'Senior Backend Engineer at You.com'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-you-com-san-francisco-ca-new-york-pehj9nfsemb8'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-15'
---

# Senior Backend Engineer at You.com

- **Company:** You.com
- **Location:** San Francisco CA New York, NY
- **Compensation:** $200k–$250k
- **Work type:** remote
- **Posted:** 2025-03-02
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-15
- **Apply:** https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/youcom/jobs/4528457008

## Job description

## About Us

At You.com, we are building the AI Search Infrastructure that powers modern AI systems. Our goal is to create the trusted knowledge layer that agents, applications, and enterprises rely on to retrieve real-time, accurate, and citation-backed information.

Our platform combines proprietary vertical indexes with LLM-optimized retrieval systems to power AI agents, applications, and enterprise workflows. We are solving hard problems across search, large language models, and large-scale infrastructure to make AI systems more reliable, transparent, and useful.

Our team includes engineers, researchers, product builders, and operators who care about solving meaningful problems and delivering real-world impact. Whether you are improving core infrastructure, shaping product experiences, or helping bring new AI capabilities to market, your work will help define how modern AI finds and uses knowledge.

## About the Role

We're looking for a strong, generalist backend engineer to help build the platform behind our AI search products and infrastructure that already supports millions of queries a day. The role spans a lot of ground: scalable systems, the APIs and SDKs developers build on top of, and the billing and account infrastructure our enterprise customers need to run their business on our platform.

This is a remote position open to candidates based anywhere in the United States. We give preference to candidates in San Francisco Bay Area or New York, where we have offices, but we're happy to consider strong remote candidates elsewhere in the US.

## Responsibilities

- Design, build, and maintain backend systems that support web-scale, AI-driven search products
- Shape our public API and SDKs into tools developers can rely on and enjoy building with
- Build the billing, account, permissions, and provisioning systems that support our enterprise customers
- Maintain performant production databases (SQL and NoSQL) and analytics stores at scale
- Apply observability practices suited to large-scale, fast-changing AI workloads
- Participate in an on-call rotation and help build monitoring that catches issues early
- Refactor and improve existing systems, and help shape team-wide best practices

## Qualifications

- A strong generalist engineer, comfortable owning the full lifecycle from design to deploy
- Strong instincts for distributed systems, data modeling, and API design, with good judgment about when to prioritize speed versus long-term scalability
- A track record of shipping and operating mission-critical services that hold up under real-world, high-volume traffic
- Primarily backend-focused (Python or similar), comfortable working across the stack when needed
- Familiar with Kubernetes, CI/CD pipelines, and debugging system-level issues
- Experience with at least one of: billing/payments systems, B2B SaaS tooling, enterprise software, or LLM/AI model integrations and products
- Strong product instincts and a builder's mindset — motivated by solving the underlying customer problem, not just closing out a ticket

Our salary bands are structured based on a combination of geographic tiers and internal leveling. Compensation is determined by multiple factors assessed during the interview process, with the final offer reflecting these considerations.

Salary Band $200,000—$250,000 USD

Company Perks:

- Hubs in San Francisco and New York City offering regular in-person gatherings and co-working sessions

- Flexible PTO with U.S. holidays observed and a week shutdown in December to rest and recharge*

- A competitive health insurance plan covers 100% of the policyholder and 75% for dependents*

- 12 weeks of paid parental leave in the US*

- 401k program, 3% match - vested immediately!*

- $500 work-from-home stipend to be used up to a year of your start date*

- $600 technology stipend to support a portion of our hybrid/remote team's cell phone and internet expenses*

- $1,200 per year Health & Wellness Allowance to support your personal goals*

- The chance to collaborate with a team at the forefront of AI research

*Certain perks and benefits are limited to full-time employees only

You.com participates in E-Verify. We will provide the Social Security Administration (SSA) and, if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with information from each new employee’s Form I-9 to confirm work authorization. (English/Spanish: [E-Verify Participation](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u7vRUMjyxbI3xX7LkBiHgvzB8qUr8hfT/view?usp=drive_link)/[Right to Work](https://drive.google.com/file/d/19uh4fecwISKmXyK3oh2SR958R70O3CVa/view?usp=drive_link)) We are also an inclusive, equitable, and accessible workplace. Please let us know if you require accommodation for any portion of the recruitment and hiring process.

Beware of Recruiting Scams:

You.com will only contact you through official @[You.com](http://ramp.com/) email addresses and will never ask for payment or sensitive personal information during the hiring process.

Use of AI Tools During Our Hiring Process:

At You.com, we're thoughtful about how we use AI throughout our business — including our hiring process.

During certain stages of the interview process, we may use AI-powered tools to assist with administrative tasks such as scheduling, note-taking, transcription, or summarizing interview discussions. These tools are intended to support our interviewers by improving accuracy and efficiency — they do not make hiring decisions or replace human judgment.

All employment decisions are made by our recruiting team and hiring managers based on a holistic review of each candidate and applicable evaluation criteria.

If AI-assisted note-taking or transcription may be used during your interview, we will notify you in advance. If you prefer not to participate in an interview that uses these tools, you may opt out by informing your recruiter before your scheduled interview. We will work with you to provide an alternative interview experience where reasonably practicable.

Information collected during the hiring process is handled in accordance with our [Privacy Policy](https://you.com/privacy) and applicable law. By continuing with the application process, you acknowledge that you have read this notice. If AI-assisted tools are used during your interview and you have not opted out after receiving notice, you consent to their use as described above, where permitted by applicable law.

## About You.com

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: You.com provides enterprise AI solutions including a real-time web search API and deep research agents to help organizations build accurate, up-to-date AI applications.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Series C)
- **Headquarters**: Palo Alto, California, USA (with additional offices in San Francisco and New York City)
- **Founded**: 2020
- **Founders**: Richard Socher

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Enterprise AI, web intelligence, search and productivity
- **Target customers**: B2B – enterprises, developers, and knowledge workers
- **Mission statement**: “Accelerating AI’s positive impact on human progress… help people move faster, think deeper, and do more.”

## Products & Services
- **Web Search API**: Composable API for integrating real-time web data into AI agents and workflows, delivering accurate, fresh, and actionable web intelligence.
- **ARI (Advanced Research & Insights agent)**: Deep research agent that analyzes 400+ sources simultaneously with chain-of-thought reasoning, generating professional-grade research reports under five minutes with verified citations and interactive visualizations.
- **Enterprise AI Solutions**: Platform for building custom AI agents and workflows, combining public and private data sources for enterprise use.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation**: Not publicly disclosed
- **Key Metric**: Total funding raised – **$195M**
- **Latest Round**: Series C – **$100M** raised ~10 months ago (as of mid-2026)
- **Notable Investors**: Salesforce Ventures, Norwest Venture Partners, Georgian, Cox Enterprises, Untapped Ventures, and 22+ others.
- **Customers**: dpa, Wort & Bild Verlag, APCO, HanseMerkur
- **Growth Signals**: Rapid funding growth from seed to Series C within ~5 years; expanding enterprise customer base; developer-focused product launches (ARI, Web Search API).

## Competitive Advantages
- **Proprietary web intelligence infrastructure**: Combines real-time web indexing with chain‑of‑thought reasoning to ensure accuracy and freshness.
- **Composable, developer-first APIs**: Easy integration into existing AI stacks, making agents “accurate, trustworthy, and up-to-date.”
- **Privacy and data control**: Emphasizes user privacy and customizable search experiences, differentiating from ad‑driven search competitors.
- **Leadership**: CEO Richard Socher (former Salesforce Chief Scientist, inventor of word vectors and prompt engineering) and a strong technical team.

## Strategic Focus
- **Scale enterprise sales**: Targeting large organizations with AI agent solutions for research, knowledge management, and workflow automation.
- **Deepen API ecosystem**: Growing adoption of web search API among developers and AI companies.
- **Product expansion**: Continually launching new AI agents (like ARI) to address specific use cases.
- **Global team building**: Hiring across engineering, product, and developer relations roles in the US.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Values-driven (“Facts, Urgency, Excellence, Kindness, Trust, Impact”) with a focus on curiosity, collaboration, and creativity.
- **Work policy**: Hybrid – flexible in‑office/remote balance. Offices in San Francisco and New York City.
- **Benefits**:
  - Flexible PTO, 10 paid U.S. holidays, plus year‑end company closure
  - Comprehensive health plans, HSA with employer contributions, FSAs
  - 401(k) with up to 3% employer match, immediate vesting
  - Up to 12 weeks paid parental leave
  - Mental health & wellness support (Function Health, OneMedical, Carrot, etc.)
  - Monthly technology stipends and home office setup allowance
- **Engineering culture**: Small but growing team (~100 employees, 50 in product + tech); uses modern stack (Kubernetes, Next.js); encourages shipping quality work quickly.

## Sources
1. [you.com/careers](https://you.com/careers?hsLang=en)
2. [you.com/about](https://you.com/about?hsLang=en)
3. [cbinsights.com](https://www.cbinsights.com/company/youcom)
4. [builtin.com](https://builtin.com/company/youcom)

## Other roles at You.com

- [Developer Community Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/developer-community-manager-you-com-san-francisco-djk6215avyej) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior Developer Relations Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-developer-relations-engineer-you-com-san-francisco-mpzkn00nfpyn) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior AI Engineer, Product Engineering](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-ai-engineer-product-engineering-you-com-san-francisco-qqyhrt3r90fn) — San Francisco, CA
- [Technical Product Marketing Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/technical-product-marketing-manager-you-com-san-francisco-6cz2hgxa5vzt) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior Search Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-search-engineer-you-com-san-francisco-mah5t3r48mhj) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior Backend Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-tucows-domains-canada-f6wqma285jvp) — Canada
- [Senior Backend Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-mintlify-san-francisco-cvt37pdy5qvf) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior Backend Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-emma-the-sleep-company-frankfurt-4b92a5beqwct) — Frankfurt, Germany
- [Senior Backend Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-bunch-sao-paulo-3qb8fp5y9rjw) — São Paulo, Brazil
- [Senior Backend Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-backend-engineer-verkada-san-mateo-ca-8cbw2zg7ym0t) — San Mateo CA, United States