Platform Engineering Lead (IKEA Kreativ 3D AI app)

Geomagical Labs is crafting visual AI experiences for tens of millions of users around the world, on web & mobile apps, in partnership with IKEA.  We are the creators of the pioneering IKEA Kreativ app, which allows customers to scan photorealistic models of their indoor spaces, then reimagine them with new furniture in life-like 3D, from anywhere – changing home commerce along the way.

About the role

We have an opening for a hands-on technical leader of our cloud-based Platform Engineering team.  Platform Engineering builds and runs our backend services for IKEA Kreativ used by tens of millions of users a year (product catalog, search, identity, 3D assets, room models, etc.), hosts AI pipelines, operates our cloud auto-scaling infrastructure, and provides DevOps foundations.

You will be expected to be a wise, can-do leader and technologist, and also a great collaborator & teammate.

In this role you will :

• Lead backend engineering & cloud infra / ops - Your team will efficiently architect and build new backend services, APIs, and pipelines to improve our products' functionality, and improve performance. Your team will also build and operate infrastructure and tooling to maintain, observe, and scale our cloud operations, ensuring visibility and reliability, cost-effectiveness, and security - while minimizing human intervention.
• Serve as a wise, can-do, technology leader - We value hands-on technical skill, and deep technology understanding, to be able to wisely direct strategy, synthesize viewpoints, mentor teams, and build influence and respect.   Expectations will vary from time-to-time, but anticipate 70% of your time will be managing / planning / mentoring & 30% hands-on building / analyzing.
• Manage a direct staff of 3-5 backend engineers & infrastructure SREs - Build, mentor & nurture a high-performance team, with excellent productivity and camaraderie.  Foster skill development and high-performance culture.
• Lead technical roadmap planning and execution - ensuring the right architectural tradeoffs are made, and ensuring alignment with business goals.
• Direct the development of processes and tools - to ensure the reliable operation of a scalable, high-availability platform, including automated testing, monitoring systems and SLAs, and incident management practices.
• Oversee 24x7 production operations - for IKEA Kreativ’s backend endpoints & APIs, data store, infrastructure, and data pipelines - in collaboration with IKEA.
• Design and architect for scale & reliability - planning infrastructure, cybersecurity, data pipelines, and operations - to increase resilience and reduce operational costs.
• Build super-effective partnerships with sister teams - to productively co-develop with teams in Amsterdam, Sweden, Canada, and South America.
• Partner with AI research teams - to build & operate robust real-time data processing & MLOps infrastructure to support machine learning, and computer vision pipelines.
• Operate with autonomy and accountability – able to execute independently and reliably, and nurture a team culture that does the same.
• Shape our business strategy - by understanding the business context, being a thought-partner, and guiding our service with thoughtful questions and new ideas.

Requirements

Benefits