Senior Backend Developer

<p>acemate is building an AI learning &#x26; teaching platform for higher and further education institutions. We have strong traction, secured funding and are entering an exciting growth phase. We're looking for a passionate <strong>Senior Backend Engineer / Developer</strong> to drive our product forward and help us scale.</p>
<p><strong>About acemate</strong></p>
<p>Founded in 2024, acemate has quickly become the leading AI learning platform for higher and further education, trusted by top-tier institutions across four countries, including <strong>University of Cologne</strong>, <strong>WHU</strong> and the <strong>German Chambers of Commerce and Industry (IHKs)</strong>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Our Mission:</strong> Democratizing access to personalized learning. We don’t believe that AI will replace educators. Instead, we empower them to design and deliver personalized learning experiences at scale.</li>
<li><strong>Our Growth:</strong> We've raised pre-seed funding and are growing rapidly. While we focus on higher and further education in the DACH area today, we're already expanding into new regions and markets.</li>
<li><strong>Our Culture:</strong> We’re a young, driven team passionate about tackling the toughest challenges in education. We embrace builder culture and minimize scheduled meetings for ad-hoc discussions and maximized focus on coding and creating.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Tasks</h2>
<p><strong>What You'll Do</strong></p>
<p>Acting as a <strong>Backend Engineer</strong> and key member of the core team, you will play a major role in shaping our technical strategy and architecture. You will be given complete end-to-end ownership over the systems driving our product features, covering everything from the database schema to API responses and the observability dashboard.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Complete system ownership:</strong> You will assume total accountability for the features you develop—managing everything from initial database modeling and API design through to deployment and monitoring. You will help advance our architecture, keeping our <strong>Effect &#x26; TypeScript</strong> codebase highly maintainable, type-safe, and robust.</li>
<li><strong>Develop advanced logic, moving beyond basic endpoints:</strong> Your focus will be on the core heavy lifting of our platform. Instead of merely delivering simple CRUD operations, you will architect the asynchronous workflows, AI pipelines, and sophisticated authorization rules necessary to resolve difficult user challenges.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Previous examples of projects you might tackle:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Advanced authorization engine</strong> designed to manage increasing complexity in various institutional environments by integrating ReBac and ABAC</li>
<li><strong>Sophisticated AI pipelines</strong> built to pull both visual and textual data from documents using a combination of multiple models, subsequently embedding these topics into knowledge graphs</li>
<li><strong>System migration</strong> transitioning our architecture from a monolithic fullstack environment to a strictly type-safe API layer built with Effect</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Tech Stack:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Backend</strong>: Effect.ts, Hono, oRPC, Bun, Typescript</li>
<li><strong>Database</strong>: PostgreSQL (via Supabase)</li>
<li><strong>Infrastructure:</strong> Cloudflare (Workers, Workflows, R2, KV, Hyperdrive), Google Cloud (Gemini, Cloud Run)</li>
<li><strong>Tooling</strong>: Axiom, Sentry, PostHog, Langfuse, Stripe</li>
<li><strong>AI</strong>: Vercel AI SDK</li>
</ul>
<p>There is no need to stress if you aren't an expert in every technology on day one. We trust in your capacity to learn rapidly and adjust to new tools and frameworks as our journey progresses.</p>
<h2>Requirements</h2>
<p><strong>What We're Looking For</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>2+ years of software engineering experience</strong> with strong TypeScript skills</li>
<li><strong>Startup experience</strong>: You’re comfortable in fast-paced, evolving environments</li>
<li><strong>Balanced AI approach:</strong> You knew how to code before Cursor and Claude Code, but understand how to leverage them effectively</li>
<li><strong>Product passion:</strong> High identification with our mission to transform education</li>
<li><strong>Bonus</strong>: Experience with authz systems, infra/devops, AI, or frontend work (Next.js/React)</li>
</ul>
<h2>Benefits</h2>
<p><strong>Benefits</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>Competitive salary package with equity component</li>
<li>Fully covered Deutschlandticket</li>
<li>BusinessBike (bike or e-bike via leasing, also for private use )</li>
<li>Working in a small but driven team built around performance and learning</li>
<li>Flexible environment with high degree of autonomy</li>
<li>Frequent team events and acemate parties! 🥳</li>
</ul>
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