RIVR, part of Amazon is a robotics company pioneering Physical AI through real-world doorstep delivery. Founded in 2024 as an ETH Zurich spin-off, RIVR developed wheeled-legged robots designed to operate in complex, unstructured environments such as stairs, gates, doors, and uneven urban terrain. We believe that achieving general physical intelligence requires solving real customer problems in the real world, where robots can learn from rich operational data at scale.
Following our acquisition by Amazon in March 2026, we are continuing this mission with greater reach and speed. By combining custom robot hardware, onboard autonomy, and cloud-based coordination, RIVR, part of Amazon is building the next generation of safe, reliable autonomous robots for last-mile delivery
Job Description As our next Senior Backend Engineer you will focus on the design, development, and operation of the server-side systems that power our cutting-edge robotics delivery platform. This role involves building robust, scalable microservices and integrations crucial for fleet operations, process integrations, and data processing in a cloud-native environment. You will play a key part in translating complex business requirements into reliable and efficient backend solutions.
What you’ll be doing
- Design and implement backend services for integrating RIVR's platform with our customers’ systems, to provide delightful delivery experiences.
- Develop and enhance the backend infrastructure for our robot operations platform.
- Develop backend components to aggregate Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), providing insights into platform performance and business value.
- Contribute to the overall architecture, reliability, and scalability of our backend systems within a containerized microservices context.
- Collaborate closely with frontend, robotics, and infrastructure engineers to deliver end-to-end features
What you must have
Approximately 5 years of professional experience designing, building, deploying, and operating backend systems in a Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) context. You have production experience with:
Strong experience with Typescript, Java, C++ and/or Python
Service decomposition.
API design.
Different interaction patterns (e.g. RPC, publish/subscribe, event-driven).
At least two database technologies
Trading off consistency for availability/performance.
Proven experience (5+ major services) with at least one major cloud provider (AWS strongly preferred).
Demonstrable experience in at least one of the following areas:
Integrating with complex third-party APIs and building reliable, distributed workflows (e.g., using task queues, state machines).
Building event-driven applications and/or scalable data processing pipelines (e.g., using Kafka, message queues, serverless functions).
A business-oriented mindset, with a focus on leveraging technology to solve concrete problems and deliver value.
A strong sense of ownership, comfortable venturing beyond immediate expertise to understand and solve problems effectively.
The ability to earn trust by providing and receiving candid, constructive feedback.
Willingness to participate in on-call rotations to ensure the reliability of our production systems.
Excellent communication skills, with the ability to articulate complex technical ideas clearly and drive mutual understanding across teams with diverse technical backgrounds.
Get some bonus points
Familiarity configuring and operating CI/CD pipelines.
Background in robotics, IoT, fleet management, or real-time data streaming systems.
Strong familiarity with observability such as OTLP, Grafana, prometheus, etc preferably in the context of devices with intermittent connectivity
