Senior Backend Software Engineer - Distributed Systems

About Us:

Havoc is a leader in all-domain collaborative autonomy. Its software-defined hardware approach powers military and commercial-grade autonomous systems across sea, air, and land to sense, decide, and act together in complex and contested environments. Havoc connects assets, enabling them to share information, adapt in real time, and continue operating even when communications are disrupted or denied. Havoc optimizes mission performance and minimizes human risk.

Havoc was founded in 2024 and headquartered in Providence, Rhode Island. Learn more at

Havoc: All-Domain Collaborative Autonomy.

About the Role

We are seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to drive the development of scalable, high-performance backend systems that power our autonomous platforms.

In this role, you will be hands-on in architecture and development as a senior individual contributor. You will be responsible for designing and building highly concurrent, distributed systems in Go, helping set technical direction, and ensuring reliable, secure, and performant backend services.

You will work closely with frontend, platform, autonomy, and embedded teams to deliver systems that operate reliably in real-world, mission-critical environments.

This role is ideal for someone who combines deep backend expertise with strong technical judgment and thrives in fast-paced, high-ownership environments.

Key Responsibilities

• Technical Ownership
• Drive execution and technical excellence across backend projects
• Set engineering standards, conduct code reviews, and guide architectural decisions
• Contribute to backend roadmap and delivery in partnership with product and engineering leadership
• Foster a culture of ownership, quality, and continuous improvement
• Backend Architecture & Development
• Design, build, and maintain scalable, highly concurrent backend services in Go
• Architect distributed systems that support high throughput, reliability, and real-time operations
• Define service boundaries, APIs, and data models across systems
• Design services for high availability and fault tolerance across availability zones
• Evolve singleton services into multi-zone, distributed deployments
• System Performance & Reliability
• Optimize backend systems for performance, scalability, and resilience
• Identify and resolve bottlenecks in distributed systems and concurrency-heavy workloads
• Ensure systems meet high standards for uptime and operational reliability
• Improve observability, maintainability, and operational readiness of backend services
• Cross-Functional Collaboration
• Partner with frontend, platform, autonomy, and embedded teams to integrate services across applications and devices
• Support end-to-end system design from edge devices to cloud infrastructure
• Contribute to system-level architecture across the stack
• Help align backend capabilities with product, platform, and mission needs
• Security & Best Practices
• Enforce secure development practices across backend systems
• Maintain high standards for code quality, testing, documentation, and reliability
• Support technical reviews, design discussions, and production readiness efforts
• Build systems with security, scalability, and long-term maintainability in mind

Qualifications

• 6+ years of experience in backend engineering, distributed systems engineering, or related software engineering roles
• Strong expertise in Go and building highly concurrent systems
• Experience designing and operating highly available, fault-tolerant distributed systems at scale
• Experience with consensus and coordination primitives, such as etcd, Raft, leader election, or similar patterns for multi-zone deployments
• Strong API design and system architecture skills
• Experience with Kubernetes and containerized environments
• Deep understanding of performance optimization, data structures, and system design
• Ability to drive projects from concept through production
• Strong technical judgment and ability to operate independently in fast-moving environments
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• U.S. citizenship and ability to obtain and maintain a security clearance
• Preferred Skills
• Experience with IoT, robotics, autonomous systems, or distributed hardware systems
• Strong networking fundamentals and debugging experience
• Experience with AWS or cloud-based infrastructure
• Familiarity with embedded systems or hardware integration
• Experience supporting mission-critical, real-world deployed systems
• Experience working in small, fast-moving engineering teams or high-growth technology companies
• Active or prior security clearance

What Success Looks Like

Within 12 months, success in this role looks like consistent delivery of high-quality backend systems that support real-world deployments. You will have helped establish scalable service architecture, clear backend standards, well-defined service boundaries, and improved system performance, reliability, and maintainability.

You will also have built strong alignment across platform, autonomy, embedded, frontend, and product teams while helping ensure HavocAI’s backend systems are ready to support mission-critical autonomous operations.

Our Values:

Innovation:

We are driven to break new ground. Every day presents an opportunity to challenge the status quo, think boldly, and deliver advanced solutions that transform the future of defense technology.

Integrity:

We hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards, ensuring transparency, accountability, and trust in all our actions and partnerships.

Mission-Driven:

We are focused on achieving impactful outcomes that align with our core mission—protecting lives through innovation.

Forward-Leaning:

We continuously seek out new opportunities and remain at the forefront of technological advancements. We embrace change and anticipate the challenges of tomorrow with confidence and creativity.

Ownership of All Tasks:

At HavocAI, no problem is too complex or too trivial. We believe that greatness comes from tackling the hardest challenges, but also in handling the smallest, sometimes thankless, tasks with the same level of commitment and care.

Servant Leadership:

We lead by serving others, whether it’s supporting our employees, partners, or the broader community. Empowering those around us is key to achieving long-term success and making a lasting impact.