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About Upstart
Upstart is the leading AI lending marketplace partnering with banks and credit unions to expand access to affordable credit. By leveraging Upstart's AI marketplace, Upstart-powered banks and credit unions can have higher approval rates and lower loss rates across races, ages, and genders, while simultaneously delivering the exceptional digital-first lending experience their customers demand. More than 80% of borrowers are approved instantly, with zero documentation to upload.
Upstart is a digital-first company, which means that most Upstarters live and work anywhere in the United States. However, we also have offices in San Mateo, California; Columbus, Ohio; and Austin, Texas.
Most Upstarters join us because they connect with our mission of enabling access to effortless credit based on true risk. If you are energized by the impact you can make at Upstart, we’d love to hear from you!
The Team
Upstart’s new Core GenAI Platform team is building foundational infrastructure that democratizes access to generative AI/LLMs for every product and engineering team across the company.
As a Senior Software Engineer on Upstart's Core GenAI Platform team, you will help design and build a unified interface for securely interacting with large language models - abstracting away the complexity of model selection, prompt orchestration, evaluation, and scaling. You'll help build a centralized GenAI layer that enables engineers to use best-in-class LLMs through clean APIs, configurable pipelines, and intuitive tooling.
Reporting to our Senior Director of Engineering, the team operates with broad scope and high visibility, partnering across Machine Learning, Product, and Compliance to ensure every model integration is performant, secure, and compliant. Whether it's embedding LLMs in user-facing products or optimizing backend workflows, this team makes it seamless for Upstart Engineering to adopt and scale GenAI company-wide.
How you’ll make an impact:
- Build the Core GenAI platform powering generative AI use cases across all of Upstart Engineering.
- Design and implement reliable, observable infrastructure for model inference, prompt orchestration, and data workflows.
- Drive cross-functional adoption of AI tooling by delivering reusable components and intuitive interfaces.Increase developer productivity through automation, metrics dashboards, and streamlined GenAI integrations.
- Set the technical roadmap for platform capabilities, balancing innovation with reliability and compliance.
- Partner with ML researchers, product engineers, and design to bridge experimentation and production.
- Ensure the platform adheres to emerging standards of security, fairness, and explainability for LLM systems.
What we’re looking for:
- Minimum requirements:
- 6+ years of experience in object-oriented software engineering, with a strong systems engineering background
- Proven experience independently leading impactful, cross-functional, multi-quarter projects with mid-large teams
- Proficiency in backend development with Python (leveraging frameworks like FastAPI, Flask, or similar), microservices architecture, and infrastructure tools like Kubernetes, Docker, and Terraform
- Hands-on experience building ML platforms or infrastructure supporting LLMs or inference systems
- Familiarity with observability tools (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog) and data processing pipelines
- Strong written and verbal communication skills and a collaborative approach to cross-functional work
- Strong stakeholder management skills
- Preferred qualifications:
- Full Stack development skills including hands on experience with React or similar
- Proficiency with Kotlin or Java and the Spring framework ecosystem
- Experience with LLM toolchains such as LangChain, LlamaIndex, or OpenAI APIs
- Deep understanding of model inference optimization (e.g., quantization, ONNX, streaming)
- Exposure to retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), vector databases (e.g., FAISS, Pinecone), or prompt engineering
- Experience operationalizing LLMs in production, including latency management and prompt versioning
- Ability to influence platform direction and drive alignment across multiple engineering teams
- Awareness of LLM-specific risk domains, including hallucinations, fairness, and data privacy
Position Location - This role is available in the following locations: Remote, San Mateo, Columbus, Austin
Time Zone Requirements - This team operates across all U.S. time zones.
Travel Requirements - This team has regular on-site collaboration sessions. These occur 3 days per quarter at an Upstart office. If you need to travel to make these meetups, Upstart will cover all travel related expenses.
What you'll love:
- Competitive Compensation (base + bonus & equity)
- Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with Health Savings Account contributions from Upstart
- 401(k) with 100% company match up to $4,500 and immediate vesting and after-tax savings
- Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP)
- Life and disability insurance
- Generous holiday, vacation, sick and safety leave
- Supportive parental, family care, and military leave programs
- Annual wellness, technology & ergonomic reimbursement programs
- Social activities including team events and onsites, all-company updates, employee resource groups (ERGs), and other interest groups such as book clubs, fitness, investing, and volunteering
- Catered lunches + snacks & drinks when working in offices
#LI-REMOTE
#LI-MidSenior
At Upstart, your base pay is one part of your total compensation package. The anticipated base salary for this position is expected to be within the below range. Your actual base pay will depend on your geographic location–with our “digital first” philosophy, Upstart uses compensation regions that vary depending on location. Individual pay is also determined by job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your preferred location during the hiring process.
In addition, Upstart provides employees with target bonuses, equity compensation, and generous benefits packages (including medical, dental, vision, and 401k).
Upstart is a proud Equal Opportunity Employer. We are dedicated to ensuring that underrepresented classes receive better access to affordable credit, and are just as committed to embracing diversity and inclusion in our hiring practices. We celebrate all cultures, backgrounds, perspectives, and experiences, and know that we can only become better together.
If you require reasonable accommodation in completing an application, interviewing, completing any pre-employment testing, or otherwise participating in the employee selection process, please email [email protected]
https://www.upstart.com/candidate_privacy_policy
Upstart San Mateo, California, USA Office
Upstart's office in San Mateo is located on the peninsula between San Francisco and the South Bay with easy Caltrain access and proximity to several apartment complexes. The office is close to several shopping donations including an outdoor beer garden.
What you need to know about the San Francisco Tech Scene
Key Facts About San Francisco Tech
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