Senior Core C++ Developer

Senior Core C\+\+ Developer — AmericasSummary

Join Exponential Technology as the Senior Core C\+\+ Developer for the Americas — a senior management\-level engineering leader who will own and drive all software architecture decisions across the firm’s core technology stack. You will be responsible for designing, building, and optimizing high\-performance systems in C\+\+, while also contributing across Go, Python, and other languages as needed. This is not a single\-language role: you are the chief architect who happens to lead with C\+\+. You will work closely with the Senior Core Developer in APAC to ensure architectural coherence across time zones, mentor the engineering team, and set the technical direction that underpins ETI’s data products. As a member of the senior management team, you will have direct input on product strategy, technology roadmap, and hiring decisions.

Day\-to\-Day Responsibilities

• Lead all software architecture decisions across ETI’s core technology stack — data warehouse engine, query processing, data ingestion, real\-time streaming, and API layer.
• Design and implement high\-performance, low\-latency systems in C\+\+ for data processing, analytics computation, and platform infrastructure.
• Develop and maintain production code across C\+\+, Go, and Python as the problem demands. Language selection is driven by engineering tradeoffs, not personal preference.
• Define and enforce coding standards, code review practices, and architectural patterns across the engineering organization.
• Collaborate daily with the Senior Core Developer in APAC to maintain architectural coherence, coordinate feature development, and ensure seamless handoffs.
• Own the performance engineering discipline: profiling, benchmarking, memory optimization, cache efficiency, and compute optimization across CPU, SSD, and memory\-mapped workloads.
• Design and implement data adaptors for new file formats, databases, and streaming sources.
• Contribute to build system architecture, CI/CD pipeline design, and automated testing frameworks.
• Evaluate build\-vs\-buy decisions for core infrastructure components and recommend technology choices to leadership.
• Participate in product strategy discussions as a member of the senior management team — translate business requirements into technical architecture.
• Mentor and develop junior and mid\-level engineers. Set the bar for engineering excellence.
• Conduct and lead technical interviews for engineering hires.
• Contribute to pre\-sales engineering: technical deep\-dives with prospects, POC architecture, and integration planning.

AI and Automation Responsibilities

• Leverage AI coding assistants (Claude Code, Windsurf, Cursor) to accelerate development velocity across C\+\+, Go, and Python codebases.
• Architect systems that integrate LLM\-powered analytics into the core platform — design the interfaces between traditional high\-performance code and AI/ML components.
• Use LLM\-based tools for code review, test generation, documentation, and architectural documentation.
• Evaluate and integrate emerging AI developer tools into the engineering workflow. Define the team’s AI\-augmented development practices.
• Design Agentic AI workflows for automated build, test, deployment, and monitoring pipelines.
• Collaborate with the Quantitative Research team to optimize and productionize ML/AI model inference in performance\-critical paths.

Requirements

• 10\+ years of professional software engineering experience with deep expertise in modern C\+\+ (C\+\+17/20\). You write idiomatic, high\-performance C\+\+ — templates, move semantics, RAII, constexpr, and zero\-cost abstractions are second nature.
• Demonstrated experience as a software architect or technical lead responsible for system\-wide design decisions in a production environment.
• Strong proficiency in at least two additional languages: Go, Python, Rust, or similar. You are a polyglot engineer who selects the right tool for the job.
• Deep understanding of systems programming: memory management, cache hierarchy, CPU architecture, SIMD, multi\-threading, and lock\-free data structures.
• Experience with high\-performance data processing: columnar data formats (Apache Arrow), memory\-mapped I/O, zero\-copy techniques, and WebAssembly (WASM).
• Strong database and query engine fundamentals — understanding of query planning, execution engines, storage formats, and indexing strategies.
• Proficiency with Docker and Kubernetes for containerized deployment of compiled services.
• Solid networking knowledge: TCP/IP, HTTP/2, gRPC, WebSockets, and low\-latency communication patterns.
• Experience with CI/CD systems, automated testing, and build tooling for C\+\+ projects (CMake, Bazel, or similar).
• Proficiency with Agentic AI platforms and AI coding assistants — demonstrated ability to integrate AI tools into the development workflow.
• Significant financial services experience — direct exposure to market data systems, trading infrastructure, low\-latency systems, or financial data platforms.
• Track record of hiring, mentoring, and leading engineering teams.
• Excellent communication skills — able to articulate architectural decisions to both technical and non\-technical audiences, and to represent engineering in leadership discussions.

Cultural Fit — Who Thrives at ETI

* High Executive Functioning Skills — Ability to plan, prioritize, organize, and execute complex architectural work independently. Self\-managing with strong working memory and the ability to hold entire system designs in your head.

* Excellent Communicator — Clear, precise verbal and written communication. Able to articulate architectural decisions and trade\-offs to leadership, clients, and junior engineers alike.

* Team Player — Collaborative, ego\-free contributor who elevates the entire engineering team. Willing to write a test, fix a bug, or review code regardless of seniority.

* Rapid Learner — Demonstrates a pattern of quickly mastering new technologies, paradigms, and domains. The AI landscape is moving fast; you keep up.

* Full Product Lifecycle Experience — Concrete experience across ideation, design, development, testing, deployment, monitoring, and iteration. You have shipped real systems to real users.

* Significant Financial Services Experience — Understanding of the domain’s unique requirements around data quality, latency, compliance, and security.

* Continuous Learner — Willingness and demonstrated habit of continuously learning. You read source code for fun, follow language evolution proposals, and experiment with new tools.

* Critical Thinker — Questions assumptions, identifies root causes, and proposes well\-reasoned architectural solutions. You do not cargo\-cult patterns.

* Avid Reader — Reads continuously: C\+\+ standards proposals, systems programming blogs, academic papers, and technical books.

* Composure Under Pressure — Maintains a calm, professional temperament during production incidents, architecture debates, and tight deadlines.

Would Be Great If You Also Have Exposure To

• Apache Arrow internals and columnar data processing at the implementation level.
• WebAssembly (WASM) for portable, high\-performance compute modules.
• Compiler development, code generation, or JIT compilation.
• GPU programming (CUDA, OpenCL) for compute\-intensive workloads.
• Distributed systems design: consensus protocols, replication, and fault tolerance.
• Real\-time streaming architectures and event\-driven systems.
• Machine Learning model optimization and inference in C\+\+.
• Open\-source contributions to performance\-critical projects.
• Experience at a quantitative trading firm, market data vendor, or exchange technology team.

Compensation and Benefits

• Competitive base salary commensurate with experience and seniority.
• Stock option grant as a member of the senior management team — significant equity participation in ETI’s growth as a pre\-Series A team member.
• Performance\-based cash bonuses.
• Health, dental, and vision insurance.
• 401(k) retirement plan.
• Additional benefits as the company scales.

About Exponential Technology

At Exponential, we empower enterprises to innovate more rapidly by leveraging on\-prem and on\-cloud data technology in combination with tightly integrated analytics and LLM toolsets. By integrating data into a high\-performance and flexible data backplane, we help businesses of all sizes overcome data entropy and unlock their true analytical capacity as an organization. With over 25 years of experience in the institutional investment space, we leverage our knowledge to extract value from data with our State\-of\-the\-Art Technology and Analytics stack.

We are an AI\-native company. Every team member — from engineering to marketing to operations — uses Agentic AI and AI\-powered tools daily. If you are excited about working at the frontier of AI\-augmented productivity in financial data technology, we want to hear from you.

Exponential Technology Inc. \| Chicago, IL \| exponential\-tech.ai

Pay: $150,000\.00 \- $250,000\.00 per year

Benefits:

• 401(k)
• AD\&D insurance
• Dental insurance
• Disability insurance
• Health insurance
• Vision insurance

Work Location: Hybrid remote in Chicago, IL 60606