--- title: 'Staff Backend Engineer – AI at Stream' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/staff-backend-engineer-ai-stream-amsterdam-yjp9z96dpa8e' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-09-09' --- # Staff Backend Engineer – AI at Stream - **Company:** Stream - **Location:** Amsterdam, Netherlands - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** hybrid - **Posted:** 2026-08-24 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-09 - **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/stream/d816fdaf-f25b-4d08-99da-d85d8adc51e4 ## Job description ## ABOUT STREAM Stream (GetStream.io http://GetStream.io)'s SDKs and APIs enable devs to build activity feeds, chat, and voice/video, powering over a billion end users worldwide. Trusted by top brands like Strava, Nextdoor, Patreon, and eBay, we're on a mission to make real-time communication and social experiences seamless for developers and their users. We're also the makers of Vision Agents https://visionagents.ai/, the open-source Python framework for building low-latency voice and video AI agents: over 8k stars on GitHub, 35+ model integrations, and sub-500ms latency on our global edge network. ## ROLE OVERVIEW We're seeking a Staff AI Engineer to own model development on our AI team. You'll build, fine-tune, evaluate, and ship the models that run inside Stream's products, end-to-end, from dataset design through to production. As the technical owner, you will drive key decisions independently, shipping models that directly impact systems serving over a billion users. Location: Office in Amsterdam or Remote (Europe). Occasional travel for in-person collaboration and meetups is encouraged. Hybrid policy: applicants based in the Netherlands or relocating here, are expected to work in the office in Amsterdam 3 times per week. Exemptions apply to specific cases. ## WHAT WILL YOU WORK ON - Own the development, fine-tuning, and evaluation of in-house AI models from dataset design through to production deployment. - Run supervised fine-tuning and post-training experiments, establishing the benchmarks and evaluation harnesses that tell us whether a model is actually good enough to ship. - Build and maintain the data pipelines that feed model training, keeping data quality, labelling, and reproducibility to a high standard. - Take models to production on Stream's serving stack, tuning for latency, cost, and reliability at high volume. - Set the technical direction for an intentionally undefined problem space, deciding what to build, what to test, and what to abandon. - Work across the wider engineering organisation, interfacing with Go-based API teams and infrastructure to get models integrated into the product. - Contribute to the open-source ecosystem where relevant, and share work publicly through code, writing, or community engagement. - Raise the bar on engineering standards across the AI team through code review, mentorship, and pragmatic best practices. ## ABOUT YOU - 5+ years of production-level Python engineering experience, with code you have shipped and maintained rather than only prototyped. - Hands-on machine learning experience, specifically with supervised fine-tuning and post-training of models. - Familiarity with the modern fine-tuning and serving toolchain, e.g. Unsloth, Fireworks, Baseten, or equivalents. - Cloud experience with at least one major provider (GCP or AWS), including infrastructure-as-code with Terraform. - Experience running ML-based products in production: not just training models, but owning them through deployment, monitoring, retraining, and iteration against real usage. - Experience designing and operating data pipelines for training and evaluation; a data engineering background is a strong route into this role. - Demonstrated ownership: a track record of picking up ambiguous problems and driving them to a result without waiting for direction. - Strong communication skills and comfort working in a small, distributed, fast-moving team. ## PREFERRED - A visible open-source footprint: libraries you have authored or maintained, meaningful GitHub activity, or contributions to AI model repositories. - Experience with Go (all of Stream's APIs use Go, so it helps when interacting with other teams). - Deep understanding of Python's concurrency model and asyncio's limitations in high-throughput systems. - Experience with real-time or low-latency inference systems. - Experience as an early engineer or founder, or otherwise operating at startup pace with an undefined roadmap. ## WHY YOU'LL LOVE THIS ROLE - Genuine Ownership: You own model development end to end: approach, architecture, evaluation, and what ships. Not a slice of someone else's roadmap. - Your Work Reaches Real Scale Immediately: Models go into production across products serving over a billion end users. You'll know quickly whether something worked, because real traffic will tell you. - Small Team, Short Path: We're small enough that there's no layer between your decisions and their impact. If you want to test something, you test it—not build a case for it over two quarters. - Peers Who Ship: The same AI team built Vision Agents from nothing into a framework thousands of developers rely on. You'll be working next to the people who did it. - Flexibility & Trust: Choose your work style—join us in Amsterdam or work remotely across Europe—with periodic in-person collaboration. ## WHAT WE HAVE TO OFFER YOU Stream employees enjoy some of the best job benefits in the industry: - A team of exceptional (and friendly) engineers - The chance to work on OSS projects - 28 days paid time off plus paid Dutch holidays - Company equity - A pension scheme - A Learning and Development budget - Commute expenses to Amsterdam covered or the option to use a company bike within the city - Fitness stipend - Monthly in-office chair massages by a professional - MacBook Pro - Healthy team lunches and plenty of snacks - A generous relocation package - An office in the heart of Amsterdam Note: this list of job benefits applies to Netherlands-based employees and is adjusted per your location of residence. ## OUR CULTURE Stream has a casual social culture, our team is diverse and we all have different backgrounds. Now, Stream is a team of over 120 peers from over 35 countries across the globe. We value transparency, aim for excellence, and support each other on our way to new victories. Our team consists of the strongest talents worldwide, making Stream a great place to learn and improve your skills. When it comes to software engineering jobs, our culture is oriented towards ownership and quality: our goal is to deliver stable software. Hybrid office policy: applicants based (or relocating to) one of our office locations are expected to work according to the applicable local office attendance policy. Equal opportunity employer statement: Stream provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training. Note for external recruiters: We currently have this role covered and do not accept unsolicited agency resumes. We are not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes. ## About Stream ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: Stream provides a unified platform of APIs and SDKs for building scalable, real-time chat, video/audio, activity feeds, and AI-powered moderation features. - **Entity Type**: Private (Series B) - **Headquarters**: Boulder, Colorado, United States (with offices in Amsterdam, Netherlands; Skopje, North Macedonia; and Toronto, Canada) - **Founded**: 2015 - **Founders**: Thierry Schellenbach and Tommaso Barbugli ## Core Business - **Primary industry**: Technology, Information and Internet — specifically real-time communication infrastructure and developer tools. - **Target customers**: B2B — product and engineering teams at apps, social networks, marketplaces, gaming platforms, and any digital service needing in-app chat, video, or activity feeds. - **Mission or purpose**: To help apps build real-time experiences that scale, by handling the hard parts of real-time AI and infrastructure so developers can ship their actual product faster. ## Products & Services - **Chat Messaging API**: A scalable, low-latency chat API with support for offline, global messaging, and customizable UI kits. Type: SaaS API. - **Video & Audio API**: Real-time voice and video calling infrastructure. Type: SaaS API. - **Activity Feeds API**: A personalized feed engine for building social timelines and notification streams. Type: SaaS API. - **AI Moderation**: LLM-powered, real-time content moderation for text, image, video, and audio. Includes automated queues, reviewer workflows, and compliance support for DSA, Online Safety Acts, and COPPA. Type: SaaS API. - **Vision AI Agents (open-source)**: An open-source SDK for building multi-modal AI agents that can see, hear, and act — with features like RAG, tool use, phone calling, pose tracking, and object detection. Type: Open-source SDK. ## Market Standing - **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not publicly disclosed. - **Key Metric**: Total funding of **$58.25 million** (Series B). Annual revenue estimated at **$4.9 million**. - **Notable Investors/Partners**: Notable Capital (lead investor in Series A), Arthur Ventures (lead investor in Seed), Social Starts, and other investors. - **Growth Signals**: The company serves **2,000+ global apps** and powers experiences for **1+ billion end users**. Headcount is **131 employees**, growing **15.2% year-over-year** (+44 people). Operates in **26 countries** with 6 edge-server locations and a **99.999% uptime SLA**. They have recently launched an open-source Vision AI SDK and are expanding into AI agent infrastructure. ## Competitive Advantages - **Unified platform**: Combines chat, video, feeds, and moderation on a single shared infrastructure, eliminating the need to "duct-tape" multiple point solutions together. - **Performance**: Sub-9ms API response times and a battle-tested global edge network built for millions of concurrent users. - **Developer experience**: 10+ SDKs with typed APIs, clear docs, and customizable components. Ships in under 50 lines of code for many use cases. Open-source SDKs and zero lock-in. - **Enterprise readiness**: SOC 2 compliant on day one, with full audit logs, transparent reasoning, and compliance support for major regulations (DSA, COPPA, Online Safety Acts). - **AI-native**: Built-in LLM-powered moderation with fewer false positives, and a new open-source platform for multi-modal AI agents. ## Strategic Focus - **AI Agents**: A major push into real-time AI with the launch of the open-source Vision AI SDK, enabling voice, vision, and tool-use agents. Focus on edge-agnostic routing, low-latency pipelines, and modular plugins. - **Moderation & Compliance**: Deepening AI moderation capabilities to meet growing regulatory demands (DSA, Online Safety Acts). - **Global scale**: Continuing to expand edge infrastructure and support for a global customer base across 26+ countries. - **Developer community**: Maintaining and growing the open-source SDK ecosystem to drive adoption and reduce lock-in concerns. ## Why Work Here - **Culture**: Stream emphasizes mastery, transparency, and teamwork. The team is distributed across 35 nationalities with offices in Boulder, Amsterdam, Skopje, and Toronto. - **Remote/Hybrid/Office**: Offers a mix of in-office, remote (EU), and hybrid roles. Offices are located in Boulder (USA), Amsterdam (NL), Skopje (MK), and Toronto (CA). - **Notable perks**: - **Stock options** granted to all full-time employees. - **Comprehensive healthcare**, dental, and vision plans (US only) plus generous parental leave. - **401K** (US) and local pension scheme contributions (Amsterdam). - **Monthly fitness stipend**. - **Commuter benefits** (free office parking and transportation). - **Interesting technical challenges**: Working on real-time infrastructure at massive scale (1B+ end users, sub-9ms latency, 99.999% uptime). - **Engineering culture**: Heavy investment in open-source, SDK quality, and developer experience. The company is 50+ engineers strong and values shipping fast. ## Sources 1. [getstream.io](https://getstream.io/) 2. [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/getstream) 3. [Crunchbase](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/getstream-io) 4. [getstream.io/team](https://getstream.io/team/) 5. [jobs.ashbyhq.com/stream](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/stream) ## Other roles at Stream - [Senior Software Engineer, Infrastructure](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-software-engineer-infrastructure-stream-toronto-kns35txbfj83) — Toronto, Canada - [Lead Data Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/lead-data-engineer-stream-amsterdam-3rpexa5hk74w) — Amsterdam, Netherlands - [Solutions Consultant II- Trust & Safety](https://feeny.ai/job/solutions-consultant-ii-trust-safety-stream-boulder-gnsw1bc5p3ky) — Boulder, CO - [Senior Software Engineer, Infrastructure](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-software-engineer-infrastructure-stream-amsterdam-q830c6f8ee32) — Amsterdam, Netherlands - [Senior React SDK Developer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-react-sdk-developer-stream-skopje-78k01k6vg1c5) — Skopje, North Macedonia - [Sales Development Representative (US/Tech Sales)](https://feeny.ai/job/sales-development-representative-us-tech-sales-stream-boulder-azmhsaczzpdv) — Boulder, CO