{"id":784974,"url":"https://alion.io/job/userwise-principal-server-engineer","title":"Principal Server Engineer (PK)","company":{"id":687000,"name":"UserWise","domain":"userwise.io","url":"https://alion.io/company/userwise","size_band":null,"is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Workable","truth_index":{"grade":"A","score":95,"open_postings":10,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":0,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":168,"computed_at":"2026-10-31T05:58:55Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"lead","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Lahore, Pakistan"],"countries":["PK"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":18000,"max_usd":53000,"period":"year","method":"global_role_cell_scaled_by_country","sample_n":2257},"experience_years_min":null,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"CI/CD","optional":true},{"name":"CockroachDB","optional":true},{"name":"Datadog","optional":true},{"name":"GCP","optional":true},{"name":"GitHub Actions","optional":true},{"name":"GitLab CI","optional":true},{"name":"Go","optional":true},{"name":"gRPC","optional":true},{"name":"KeyDB","optional":true},{"name":"Lua","optional":true},{"name":"Memcached","optional":true},{"name":"Nakama","optional":true},{"name":"PostgreSQL","optional":true},{"name":"Prometheus","optional":true},{"name":"Python","optional":true},{"name":"Redis","optional":true},{"name":"TypeScript","optional":true},{"name":"WebSockets","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-09-07T00:00:00Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-07","last_verified_at":"2026-10-31T19:34:13Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":54,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":0,"flags":[],"days_open":54},"description":"About the Role\nWe're looking for a Principal Server Engineer to own the backend systems powering our live games - services currently supporting 1M+ DAU. You'll be responsible for performance, scalability, and reliability at the core of our infrastructure, working closely with the engineering team on everything from schema design to incident response.\nExperience: 8+ years\nNice to Have\nCI/CD and DevOps experience (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI) plus monitoring/alerting (Prometheus, Datadog)\nStrong grasp of networking protocols - WebSockets, gRPC/HTTP2, UDP/TCP tuning for low-latency real-time systems\nRequirements\nResponsibilities\nDesign, build, and maintain Go/Python backend services for live, high-traffic game titles, including server-authoritative logic and runtime modules on Nakama\nExtend and operate Nakama (Heroic Labs) for core game services: authentication, matchmaking, leaderboards, storage, RPCs, and realtime multiplayer\nOwn database schema design and query performance across PostgreSQL systems, including Nakama's storage layer\nDrive horizontal scaling strategy (Nakama clustering, stateless services), optimizing CPU/memory footprint and reducing lock contention over vertical scaling\nProfile and resolve memory leaks, CPU spikes, and deadlocks in production\nLead root-cause investigations for performance issues and outages, from detection through resolution\nArchitect and maintain in-memory caching/state layers (Redis/KeyDB/Memcached)\nDesign and run load tests against Nakama and supporting services to surface breaking points ahead of release\nRequirements\nCrucial\nDeep Go & Python expertise: language internals, execution models, and performance tuning (goroutine management, GC tuning, zero-allocation techniques)\nStrong PostgreSQL fluency: scalable schema design, query plan analysis, index strategy optimization, with real examples of resolving bottlenecks via data layout or query architecture changes (experience with Nakama's storage layer or CockroachDB a plus)\nProven experience scaling systems supporting 350k+ DAU, with a horizontal-scaling-first philosophy (efficient serialization/deserialization via Protobuf/MsgPack, reduced lock contention)\nHands-on profiling experience: identifying and resolving memory leaks, CPU spikes, and deadlocks\nAt least 2 concrete examples of complex production performance issues or outages, including root cause analysis and resolution methodology\nAt least 2 released production projects as a core backend engineer handling live traffic\nImportant\nPractical experience with Nakama (Heroic Labs): custom Go runtime modules (Lua/TypeScript a plus), matchmaker, storage engine, realtime sockets, and running Nakama clusters in production\nHands-on experience with Redis, KeyDB, or Memcached: caching, rate-limiting, state management, including cache stampede mitigation, serialization overhead, and eviction policy design\nSolid TDD/BDD judgment and practical load-testing experience (e.g., Artillery), including realtime/socket workloads\nPractical GCP/Google App Engine experience: deploying, monitoring, and scaling serverless/container servicesme multiplayer sockets\nPractical GCP/Google App Engine experience - deploying, monitoring, and scaling serverless/container services\nBenefits\nMarket competitive, tax-free USD salaries\nPrivate Health Insurance\nPaid Time Off\nPerformance Bonus\nAnnual Performance Reviews","description_format":"text","description_chars":3375,"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":["Health insurance"],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Game Development","AI Agents"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-12T01:41:28Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":88,"band":"hot","label":"Hiring now","p_open":1,"p_active":0.881,"p_room":1,"age_days":54,"expected_fill_days":168,"reasons":["conf:2","velocity","win:early"],"computed_at":"2026-10-31T05:58:55Z"},"pay":null,"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/userwise-principal-server-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/userwise-principal-server-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-31T22:46:32Z","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":35505,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-01T00:00:00Z"}},"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":687000},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=687000"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fuserwise-principal-server-engineer"},{"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%2Fuserwise-principal-server-engineer"},{"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%2Fuserwise-principal-server-engineer"},{"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/userwise-principal-server-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fuserwise-principal-server-engineer"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":784974}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"userwise.io","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":784974},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. Docs: https://alion.io/developers"}}