Senior Backend Engineer – AI Feature Innovation (f/m/d) Full-time

About the Opportunity

At Contentful, we empower thousands of customers to manage content at scale with speed, flexibility, and precision. We are seeking experienced Senior Backend Engineers (f/m/d) to join our AI Feature Innovation team-a group dedicated to pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with AI-driven content solutions.

As a Senior Backend Engineer (f/m/d), you will play a key role in architecting and developing scalable, high-performance backend services that power AI-driven features. You will focus on building robust APIs, integrating AI models, and designing backend systems that enable intelligent automation, personalization, and content augmentation within Contentful.

This role is perfect for an engineer with deep backend expertise who is passionate about AI-driven development, distributed systems, and cloud-native architectures. You will work closely with fullstack engineers, product managers, designers, and AI specialists to design and implement AI-powered features that redefine intelligent content management.
What to Expect

• Architect & Develop AI-Enabled Services: Design and implement scalable, high-performance backend systems that power AI-driven features.
• AI Integration: Work closely with AI specialists to integrate AI models, APIs, and automation services into Contentful’s backend infrastructure.
• API & Service Development: Build and maintain robust, secure, and efficient APIs to support AI-powered features.
• Distributed Systems & Data Processing: Develop event-driven, asynchronous architectures to handle AI-powered content workflows at scale.
• Cloud & Infrastructure Scaling: Leverage Docker, Kubernetes, and cloud services (AWS, GCP, Azure) to deploy, manage, and optimize backend services.
• Technical Leadership & Best Practices: Guide best practices in system design, code quality, testing, and performance optimization.
• Collaboration Across Teams: Work closely with frontend engineers, designers, AI specialists, and product managers to align backend capabilities with AI-powered feature development.
• Stay Ahead of AI Trends: Continuously explore emerging AI technologies and backend architectures, ensuring Contentful’s AI capabilities remain at the forefront of innovation.

What You Need to be Successful
Technical Expertise

• Backend Engineering Mastery: Deep expertise in Node.js (Express or Hapi), TypeScript, and backend software engineering best practices.
• Scalable API & Microservices Design: Proven experience in designing and implementing scalable, maintainable APIs.
• AI Enthusiasm & Integration: Passion for AI-driven innovation, with hands-on experience integrating AI/ML APIs, models, or services into real-world products.
• Cloud-Native Development:
• Strong experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure), including serverless functions, managed AI services, and cloud-based APIs.
• Proficiency in Docker and Kubernetes for deploying and orchestrating backend services.

• Event-Driven & Asynchronous Systems: Experience building and maintaining event-driven architectures, leveraging message queues (e.g., Kafka, RabbitMQ, SQS) and background job processing.
• Performance & Security: Experience optimizing large-scale backend systems for high availability, scalability, and security.

Soft Skills & Leadership

• Problem-Solving & Innovation: Ability to break down complex technical challenges, identify scalable solutions, and drive backend architecture decisions.
• Technical Leadership: Proven experience mentoring engineers, establishing backend development best practices, and driving technical initiatives.
• Cross-Team Communication: Ability to articulate backend requirements and AI integration strategies to frontend engineers, AI specialists, and product teams.
• Agile & Fast-Paced Execution: Comfortable working in an iterative, fast-moving development environment, balancing short-term needs with long-term backend strategy.

Preferred:

• AI/ML Feature Development: Experience building AI-powered backend services, particularly in automated content generation, NLP, or personalization.
• Foundational AI Knowledge: Understanding of LLMs (GPT, BERT), Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), and AI-driven backend architectures.
• AI Ethics & Responsible AI Practices: Awareness of bias mitigation, fairness, and security considerations in AI-driven products.

What’s in it for you?

• Join an ambitious tech company reshaping the way people build digital experiences
• Full-time employees receive Stock Options for the opportunity to share in the success of our company
• Fertility and family building benefits, including a lifetime reimbursable wallet to support your growing family.
• We value Work-Life balance and You Time!A generous amount of paid time off, including vacation days, sick days, education days, compassion days for loss, and volunteer days
• Use your personal annual education budget to improve your skills and grow in your career
• Enjoy a full range of virtual and in-person events, including workshops, guest speakers, and fun team activities, supporting learning and networking exchange beyond the usual work duties
• An annual wellbeing stipend to care for your physical, financial, or emotional health
• A monthly communication phone/internet stipend and phone hardware upgrade reimbursement.
• New hire office equipment stipend for hybrid or distributed employees. Get the gear you need to work at your best.

#LI-JE1 #LI-Hybrid

Who are we?

Contentful is the intelligent composable content platform that unlocks all of an organization’s digital content to deliver impactful customer experiences, making content a strategic business asset. The Contentful Platform, Contentful Studio, and the Contentful Ecosystem combine the flexibility of composable content with the intelligence of AI, empowering digital teams to drive business momentum through collaboration, speed, and scale. Contentful powers innovative content experiences across brands, regions, and channels for organizations around the world, including nearly 30% of the Fortune 500. Nearly 800 people from more than 70 nations contribute their energy and creativity to Contentful, working from hubs in Berlin, Denver and distributed around the world.
Everyone is welcome here!

“Everyone is welcome here” is a celebrated component of our culture. At Contentful, we strive to create an inclusive environment that empowers our employees. We believe that our products and services benefit from our diverse backgrounds and experiences and are proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applications will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, age, physical [dis]ability, or length of time spent unemployed. We invite you to apply and join us!

If you need reasonable accommodations at any point during the application or interview process, please let your recruiting coordinator know.

Please be aware of scammers who may fraudulently allege to be from Contentful. These types of fraud can be carried out through copycat websites, fake email addresses claiming to be from our company, or social media. We do not ask for your personal information such as bank account numbers, identification numbers, etc through social media or chat-based apps, nor do we request or send money for the purchase of business equipment. If you suspect fraud, please report it to your local authorities, as well as reaching out to us at security-esk@contentful.com with any information you may have.

By clicking “Apply for this job,” I acknowledge that I have read the “Contentful’s Candidate Privacy Notice”, and hereby consent to the collection, processing, use, and storage of my personal information as described therein.