--- title: 'Software Engineer - Database at MotherDuck' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/software-engineer-database-motherduck-new-york-1sefxqs5x7kx' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-09-06' --- # Software Engineer - Database at MotherDuck - **Company:** MotherDuck - **Location:** New York, NY - **Compensation:** $180k–$260k - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** hybrid - **Posted:** 2026-08-03 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-06 - **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/motherduck/111fd8f5-a8ad-4aa4-937f-79da7c2184db ## Job description ## ABOUT MOTHERDUCK Don’t let the quirky name fool you: At MotherDuck, we’re on a mission to make data warehousing fun, frictionless, and ducking awesome for developers and data practitioners building blazing fast internal and customer-facing analytics experiences. We're building a cloud-hosted version of DuckDB, working hand-in-hand with the creators of the fastest-growing and fastest-improving query engine on the planet. Unlike other databases, MotherDuck was architected to unify local development with cloud operations to bridge the gap between software and data engineering workflows. Our team is a mix of thoughtful, passionate, and empathetic data industry veterans. ## WHAT YOU WILL DO The Database team is the bridge between DuckDB and the cloud. We own the core server and client extension logic that lets DuckDB run seamlessly, whether it's local or in the cloud, and we work in C++ right alongside the DuckDB codebase itself. Our mission is to push the boundaries of embedded database performance, distributed execution, and user experience, all while staying closely connected to DuckDB Labs (the team behind DuckDB) to align on APIs and shape what's next. Day to day, we drive major projects in dual execution, resource assignment, and system reliability, while also handling incoming issues and lending our DuckDB expertise to other teams. We collaborate closely across MotherDuck and with the wider DuckDB community, making sure people get the best of both local and cloud worlds. It's a small, high-agency team with big ambitions... the kind of place where engineers own impactful projects, share what they learn, and help shape how modern analytics gets built. This role is ideally based in New York City but also open to great candidates remotely on the East Coast. Key Responsibilities: - Own major projects in our dual execution stack, so DuckDB can process queries seamlessly whether they're running locally or in the cloud. - Help build a cloud platform that dynamically assigns resources, so DuckDB stays efficient whether someone's running a tiny workload or pushing our biggest, highest-memory instances. - Lead cross-functional work with our frontend, platform, and infrastructure teams to keep the user experience coherent end to end. - Push the state of the art in embedded database performance, distributed execution, and DuckDB internals. - Deepen your DuckDB expertise and share it with the rest of the company through mentorship and documentation. - Work directly with our support team to debug issues, learn from real usage patterns, and prioritize the improvements that matter most. - Improve systems holistically... spotting architectural challenges early and clearing bottlenecks before they become problems. - Mentor teammates and help raise the bar for engineering practices across the team. - Work closely with DuckDB Labs (which grew out of the Database Architectures group at CWI, where vectorized execution and DuckDB were born) to help align on APIs and shape where DuckDB goes next. ## WHAT YOU BRING - You've built and shipped complex backend systems, and you know what great looks like. - You're fluent in a backend language like C++, Rust, Java, or similar systems languages, and you're comfortable working close to the metal. (C++ and Rust are the biggest plus here, and we love a great Java engineer too.) - A good foundation in query engines, execution plans, indexing, and performance optimization techniques. - Hands-on experience with DuckDB is a huge plus, no matter what level you're coming in at. - You've worked with cloud infrastructure, networking, and building low-latency distributed systems. - You can scope and lead projects that span multiple collaborators and cross-functional dependencies. - You take pride in clear thinking, careful design, and thoughtful tradeoffs. - You're comfortable mentoring peers and helping build a collaborative, high-agency environment. - You enjoy engaging with the wider community, whether that's open-source conversations or working directly with DuckDB Labs. ## WHAT WE PROVIDE - The opportunity to participate and contribute to DuckDB, one of most popular modern open source analytical databases. - Feather-ruffling compensation – competitive salary and stock options so you have a stake in our flock’s success. - Top-notch healthcare coverage – 100% paid medical, dental, and vision for employees, plus 80% coverage for dependents (because we care about your whole nest). - Flexible PTO – take the time you need to recharge, explore, or just have a lazy day by the pond. - 401k plan – because even ducks need to plan for the future. - Legendary company events – we bring the whole flock together twice a year for unforgettable summits in fun locations, plus 1-2 team gatherings a year to keep our bonds strong. - Flexible work environment - spend most of the week in the office collaborating with the flock, and work from wherever you're most productive the rest of the time. Specifics are role dependent and as agreed upon with your manager ## PLEASE APPLY Does this role sound appealing to you, but you’re missing some of the requirements or don’t quite think you’re qualified? Please apply anyway. Research has shown that underrepresented groups in technology often shy away from roles which aren’t a 100% match. We aim to build a diverse team and will strongly consider applicants who bring many of the requirements plus have other experiences which round out their qualifications. MotherDuck is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. MotherDuck is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with physical and mental disabilities ## PLEASE APPLY Does this role sound appealing to you, but you’re missing some of the requirements or don’t quite think you’re qualified?  Please apply anyway. Research has shown that underrepresented groups in technology often shy away from roles which aren’t a 100% match. We aim to build a diverse team and will strongly consider applicants who bring many of the requirements plus have other experiences which round out their qualifications. MotherDuck is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. MotherDuck is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with physical and mental disabilities. ## About MotherDuck ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: MotherDuck is a serverless, cloud-native data warehouse built on DuckDB that delivers sub-second query performance and AI-native analytics for humans, agents, and applications. - **Entity Type**: Private (Series B; $100M total funding) - **Headquarters**: Seattle, Washington, United States (with hubs in San Francisco, New York, and Amsterdam) - **Founded**: 2022 - **Founders**: Jordan Tigani (co‑founder & CEO, former Google BigQuery founding engineer) in partnership with DuckDB creators Hannes Mühleisen and Mark Raasveldt (DuckLabs) ## Core Business - **Industry**: Data Infrastructure and Analytics (serverless cloud data warehouse) - **Target Customers**: B2B – data teams, SaaS companies building customer‑facing analytics, AI/agent developers, and enterprises wanting to cut data warehouse costs - **Mission**: “Collapse the distance between question and answer” – make it easy for anyone to explore data without waiting on data teams ## Products & Services - **MotherDuck (Cloud Data Warehouse)**: Serverless, fully managed DuckDB service. Every user/agent gets an isolated DuckDB instance (“Duckling”) that spins up in 100ms and shuts down when idle. Supports petabyte‑scale data in S3, GCS, Azure (including Iceberg/Delta Lake). 5–10x cheaper than Snowflake/BigQuery. - **DuckLake**: The fastest, simplest lakehouse – open table format that stores metadata in a SQL database instead of thousands of files, for petabyte scale and 100x faster metadata operations. - **Dives**: AI‑generated interactive visualizations. Ask natural‑language questions, get live charts with sub‑second performance. Persistent and shareable – no separate BI tool needed. - **Flights**: Agent‑native data pipelines – scheduled Python jobs for ingestion, enrichment, and transformation, built and deployed through the MCP server. - **MCP Server (Model Context Protocol)**: Connects AI agents (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, etc.) to MotherDuck databases with fuzzy catalog search, query guidelines, and cost isolation. - **Data Sharing**: Create shareable, read‑only snapshots of databases (cross‑org collaboration). - **Read Scaling**: Replicas for high‑concurrency BI and multi‑user workloads. ## Market Standing - **Valuation**: Not disclosed - **Key Metric**: $40M annual revenue (LinkedIn estimate, 2026) + $100M total funding ($12.5M Seed, $35M Series A, $52.5M Series B) - **Notable Investors/Partners**: Andreessen Horowitz, Redpoint, Felicis (investors). Technology partners include Airbyte, Fivetran, dbt, Metabase, Tableau, Hex, Power BI, LangChain, LlamaIndex, Anthropic, Monte Carlo, and 59+ others. - **Growth Signals**: Headcount grew 54.4% YoY (to ~97 employees); active job postings increasing month over month (37.5% monthly trend, 11 open roles as of mid‑2026); strong ecosystem integration with 59 technology and 11 consulting partners. ## Competitive Advantages - **Built on DuckDB**: Inherits the blazing‑fast, in‑process query engine that improves 20% per version, while adding serverless cloud capabilities. - **Hypertenancy Architecture**: Each user/agent gets an isolated DuckDB instance – no noisy neighbors, no workload management, and no cost spikes from AI agents. - **Extreme Cost Efficiency**: Customers routinely cut warehouse costs 5–10x vs. Snowflake/BigQuery by running small queries on small machines. - **AI‑Native from Day One**: MCP server, Dives, Flights – designed for agentic and natural‑language analytics, eliminating the need for separate BI or orchestration tools. - **Seamless Embedding**: SaaS companies can give each end customer an isolated analytics backend; 100ms spin‑up and zero idle costs make it ideal for product‑embedded analytics. ## Strategic Focus - **Agentic Analytics**: Deepening AI integration (MCP, Dives, Flights) to make MotherDuck the default data layer for AI agents and natural‑language querying. - **Customer‑Facing Analytics**: Helping SaaS vendors embed isolated, fast analytics into their own products. - **Cost Migrations**: Continuing to win customers leaving expensive cloud warehouses (Snowflake, BigQuery, Redshift) by delivering comparable power at a fraction of the cost. - **Ecosystem Expansion**: Growing the 70+ partner integrations to cover more data ingestion, transformation, BI, and AI tools. ## Why Work Here - **Culture & Values**: A globally distributed team (Stretch from Seattle to Amsterdam) that values collaboration, fun (“quacking together”), and building a product that redefines data analytics. Emphasizes creativity, entrepreneurship, and building the future of data. - **Work Policy**: Remote‑first with physical hubs in Seattle, San Francisco, New York, and Amsterdam. Teams hold regular offsites. - **Benefits** (from careers page): Competitive compensation and stock options; 100% paid medical, dental, and vision for employees (85% for dependents); flexible time away; 401k plan. - **Engineering Culture**: Small, high‑impact teams; ownership from day one; opportunities to work on core database technology, cloud infrastructure, and AI integration. Engineers come from Google, AWS, Databricks, Snowflake, and DuckLabs. - **Open Roles**: 11 active positions as of mid‑2026, including Backend Engineer (Amsterdam, Seattle, SF, NYC), Customer Engineer, Implementation Solutions Engineer, Account Executive, and Business Development Representative. Salary bands: $140K–$260K for engineering roles + equity; sales roles $100K–$260K + commission. ## Sources 1. [motherduck.com (Product Overview)](https://motherduck.com/) 2. [motherduck.com (About Us)](https://motherduck.com/about-us/) 3. [motherduck.com (Careers)](https://motherduck.com/careers/) 4. [linkedin.com (Company Profile)](https://www.linkedin.com/company/motherduck) 5. 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