{"id":164324,"url":"https://alion.io/job/ginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab","title":"Software Engineer 2, Autonomous Lab","company":{"id":58589,"name":"Ginkgo Bioworks","domain":"ginkgo.bio","url":"https://alion.io/company/ginkgo-bioworks","size_band":"201-500","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":{"grade":"C","score":68,"open_postings":19,"ghost_share":0.526,"stale_share":0,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":null,"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"middle","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"explicit","locations":["Boston, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":85600,"max":120200,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":120200},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":null,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":true,"technologies":[{"name":"Agentic Workflows","optional":false},{"name":"AI Agents","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":false},{"name":"Kubernetes","optional":false},{"name":"LLM Evaluation","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"React.js","optional":false},{"name":"Rest API","optional":false},{"name":"TypeScript","optional":false},{"name":"Agile","optional":true},{"name":"AWS","optional":true},{"name":"Azure","optional":true},{"name":"Function Calling","optional":true},{"name":"GCP","optional":true},{"name":"Git","optional":true},{"name":"JavaScript","optional":true},{"name":"LangChain","optional":true},{"name":"LLM","optional":true},{"name":"Model Context Protocol","optional":true},{"name":"PostgreSQL","optional":true},{"name":"Tool Use","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-06-17T15:07:21Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-08-05","last_verified_at":"2026-10-18T08:18:04Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":122,"trust":{"level":"ghost","repost_count":0,"flags":["stale","company_stale"],"days_open":122},"description":"Our mission is to make biology easier to engineer. Ginkgo is constructing, editing, and redesigning the living world in order to answer the globe’s growing challenges in health, energy, food, materials, and more. Our bioengineers make use of an in-house automated foundry for designing and building new organisms. \nAbout the Role\nWe are seeking talented Software Engineers to join the Autonomous Lab software organization at Ginkgo Bioworks. These positions span multiple teams building Catalyst, the software platform that powers Ginkgo’s Autonomous Lab product. Catalyst encompasses everything from hardware driver interfaces and orchestration to data APIs and AI-enabled agentic workflows.\nCandidates who apply to this posting will be considered for all open Software Engineer positions across the Automation Software organization. If your application advances to a phone screen, we will work with you to determine the team and role that best fit your preferences, background, and the needs of the business.\nTo learn more about automation engineering at Ginkgo, please visitour website.\nAll positions require the candidate to work on-site Monday - Friday in our Boston office. Ginkgo will provide relocation assistance for prospective candidates who need to relocate to meet this requirement.\nApplicants must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of H-1B visas at this time.\nTeams Hiring\nEach of the following teams have open position(s). During the phone screen, we will work with you to determine which team you will primarily interview for. If you have an early preference for the team you want to join, please indicate it in the application question.\nAgent Interfaces\nThis team defines and builds how Catalyst users and AI agents interact with the platform. Engineers here own the agentic infrastructure: tool surfaces, orchestration, prompt pipelines, evaluation harnesses, and the backend APIs that make AI-enabled workflows safe and observable. They also deliver full-stack features that surface agent capabilities to scientists and operators.\nSolutions Engineering (Customer-Facing)\nThis team sits at the intersection of software engineering and customer success. Engineers build custom integrations and workflow extensions tailored to customer-specific requirements, lead deployments at customer sites, and serve as technical contributors for complex issues across the Catalyst stack. This role requires willingness and ability to travel to customer sites, domestically and occasionally internationally (up to 35%).\nOrchestrator (Scheduling & Optimization)\nThis team designs and implements the interfaces for defining and launching work on RACs, and the software for scheduling and orchestration of this work. Engineers on this team contribute to production solvers and heuristics for complex scheduling problems - resources, time windows, throughput, precedence - and help build simulation and observability infrastructure to keep the scheduler performant and reliable.\nData Management (API & Data Platform)\nThis team owns the collection, processing, and serving of RAC data in forms usable by both humans and AI. They also own the Catalyst API: The productized REST surface that internal and external consumers depend on. Engineers here work on API design, data modeling, pipeline architecture, and the schema and query infrastructure that keeps data fast, correct, and accessible.\nOps & Infra Team\nThis team is the operational foundation of the Catalyst stack, responsible for keeping it running reliably across both cloud and customer-site deployments. Engineers contribute to the Kubernetes platform, CI/CD pipelines, and release engineering that takes Catalyst from commit to production - including the on-prem deployments at external customer sites. Experience with Kubernetes and cloud infrastructure is valuable in this role.\nResponsibilities\nResponsibilities vary by team, but Software Engineers across the Catalyst organization are generally expected to:\nTechnical Delivery\nScope and deliver well-defined features and components end-to-end with minimal guidance.\nWrite clean, readable, maintainable code and apply coding principles (DRY, SOLID) with guidance from senior teammates.\nRecognize and follow established architectural patterns; contribute improvements as you grow into the codebase.\nIdentify and communicate dependencies and potential blockers proactively.\nUse AI agents and tooling to accelerate development while applying sound engineering judgment.\nCollaboration & Communication\nParticipate constructively in technical design discussions and code reviews.\nWork effectively with scientists, operators, and cross-functional partners to understand requirements and deliver solutions.\nAsk good questions, document decisions, and communicate progress clearly with the team.\nQuality & Reliability\nWrite tests at the unit and integration level; actively think through edge cases and error conditions.\nAddress bugs and failing tests promptly; contribute to a culture of quality.\nBuild logging, error handling, and observability into the software you ship.\nLearning & Growth\nActively develop expertise in your team’s technical domain and the broader Catalyst platform.\nSeek and act on feedback from peers and senior engineers; contribute mentorship to more junior teammates over time.\nMinimum Requirements\nBachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Bioinformatics, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.\nSome professional software development experience, including work on team-owned codebases in a production setting, such as internships, academic research, or full time employment.\nProficiency in Python; familiarity with additional languages relevant to your area of interest (e.g. TypeScript & React) is a plus.\nAbility to reason about code across multiple files and components; familiarity with version control (Git) and collaborative development workflows.\nStrong communication skills and eagerness to collaborate with engineers and non-engineers alike.\nPreferred Capabilities and Experience\nWe do not expect that any one candidate will have all of the following. Each is independently a preferred or “nice-to-have” capability.\nFamiliarity with laboratory automation, robotics, or scientific instrumentation.\nExposure to agentic systems, LLM-backed applications, or tool-use frameworks (LangChain, MCP, function calling, etc.).\nFamiliarity with scheduling, optimization, or operations research concepts.\nExperience with hardware communication protocols or low-level systems programming.\nExperience with specialized device software libraries such as HL8, Terapagos, and Stratum v2.\nFamiliarity with relational databases (PostgreSQL) and writing or modifying queries.\nExposure to Kubernetes, cloud infrastructure (GCP, AWS, Azure), or CI/CD pipelines.\nFamiliarity with REST API design and development.\nExperience with TypeScript/React or comparable frontend frameworks.\nProficiency with Git and experience working within agile methodologies\n85,600 USD - 120,200 USD Annual - Actual pay within this range will depend on a candidate's skills, expertise, and experience. We also offer company stock awards, a comprehensive benefits package including medical, dental & vision coverage, health spending accounts, voluntary benefits, leave of absence policies, 401(k) program with employer contribution, 8 paid holidays in addition to a full-week winter shutdown and unlimited Paid Time Off policy.\nGinkgo has implemented a return to office policy effective October 1, 2025. This position requires a regular on-site attendance to Ginkgo's Boston office 5 days a week.\nIt is the policy of Ginkgo Bioworks to provide equal employment opportunities to all employees, employment applicants, and EOE disability/vet. \nPrivacy Notice\nI understand that I am applying for employment with Ginkgo Bioworks and am being asked to provide information in connection with my application. I further understand that Ginkgo gathers this information through a third-party service provider and that Ginkgo may also use other service providers to assist in the application process. Ginkgo may share my information with such third-party service providers in connection with my application and for the start of employment. Ginkgo will treat my information in accordance with Ginkgo's Privacy Policy. By submitting this job application, I am acknowledging that I have reviewed and agree to Ginkgo's Privacy Policy as well as the privacy policies of the third-party service providers used by Ginkgo's associated with the application process.","description_format":"text","description_chars":8709,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":null,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":{"level":"bachelor","optional":false},"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Relocation assistance"],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":true,"industries":["Synthetic Biology","Industrial Biotechnology","CRO & CDMO Services"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-06-17T15:07:21Z"}],"visa":[{"country":"US","licensed_sponsor":true,"evidence":"H-1B filings in 12 months: 6","filings_12m":6,"filings_prev_12m":14,"green_card_filings_12m":0,"median_offered_wage_usd":117500,"route":null,"cap_exempt":false,"checked_at":"2026-10-15T11:24:14+00:00","sources":["US Department of Labor: LCA disclosure data (H-1B, H-1B1, E-3)","US Department of Labor: PERM disclosure data (green cards)"],"filings_for_role_12m":0}],"liveness":{"score":7,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":1,"p_active":0.245,"p_room":0.28,"age_days":121,"expected_fill_days":30,"reasons":["conf:3","stale_co","ghost","win:tail","crowd:"],"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":120200,"is_top_pay":false},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/ginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/ginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-18T08:24:41Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":12630,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-19T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":58589},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=58589"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/ginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fginkgo-bioworks-software-engineer-2-autonomous-lab"}]}