Software Engineer (Core Engine)

Your mission

As a Software Engineer, Core Engine at Tenzir, you work on the heart of our platform: the high-performance C++ execution engine that processes, transforms, and routes security telemetry at scale.

You design and evolve query execution and streaming data processing for TQL (Tenzir Query Language), tackling problems in performance engineering, query optimization, and systems design. Your work directly determines how efficiently customers can process millions of security events in production.

You collaborate closely with our founder and a small, highly technical engineering team. This role is for engineers who enjoy working close to the metal and want their systems work to have real-world impact.

Your responsibilities include:

• Evolve and optimize the query execution engine for TQL pipelines

• Improve streaming data processing for high-throughput, low-latency workloads

• Work with Apache Arrow for columnar in-memory data representation and zero-copy processing

• Implement new operators for data transformation, enrichment, and routing

• Improve query optimization techniques (e.g. predicate pushdown, operator fusion, pipeline parallelization)

• Design storage and indexing strategies for efficient data retrieval and replay

• Profile and optimize performance across the full data path
• Contribute to and help shape our open-source core engine

Your profile

Must-haves

• Significant systems programming experience in modern C++ (C++23/26)

• Experience building or working on data-intensive systems (databases, query engines, streaming systems, or similar)

• Strong computer science fundamentals (algorithms, data structures, memory management)

• Performance engineering mindset with systematic profiling and optimization

• High quality standards, including testing, edge-case handling, and failure-mode thinking

• Professional fluency in English (written and spoken)

• Residency in an EU time zone with the right to work in the EU or an EU-adequate country

Technical requirements

• Languages: Modern C++ (23/26); familiarity with Python for tooling

• Data processing: Columnar formats, vectorized execution, SIMD optimization concepts

• Systems: Memory management, concurrency, I/O optimization, Linux internals

• Formats: Apache Arrow, Parquet, or similar serialization formats

• Build & tooling: CMake and CI/CD pipelines for native code

• Nice to have: Query optimization techniques, catalog design, compression algorithms

Engineering mindset

• Enjoys shaving microseconds off hot paths

• Thinks deeply about memory layout and cache efficiency

• Likes debugging complex concurrent systems

• Cares equally about correctness and performance

• Wants to understand the full execution stack, from query plan to syscall

Nice-to-haves

• Experience with database internals (e.g. DuckDB, ClickHouse, DataFusion, Velox, PostgreSQL)

• Background in streaming systems (Kafka, Flink, or similar)

• Familiarity with query languages and parsers

• Open-source contributions to data infrastructure projects

• Exposure to security data formats (CEF, LEEF, syslog) or SIEM systems
• Ability to navigate adjacent stacks (e.g. TypeScript or platform code)

Why us?

Why us?

• Hard problems: Work on real query execution, streaming processing, and performance optimization in production

• Apache Arrow ecosystem: Build on cutting-edge columnar data technology used across the industry

• Open source: Contribute to a core engine with real users and an active community

• Full-stack impact: Your engine work directly affects customer-visible performance and scalability

• Small team: Direct collaboration with founders and engineers, no layers of abstraction

• Early-stage upside: Meaningful equity participation through our VSOP

• Compensation: Base salary range of €60,000–€115,000 (depending on experience and location)

• Remote work: Fully remote within EU time zones

• Employment model: Direct employment in Germany; contractor model outside Germany

• Equipment & team: Equipment provided for employees; quarterly team meetups and one annual company-wide retreat

Interview process

Our hiring process typically takes 2–3 weeks and includes the following steps:

• Initial call (30 minutes) with our engineering lead

• Technical interview (60 minutes) including code review, architecture discussion, and live problem-solving

• Team fit conversation (30 minutes) with a founder and HR

Reference checks and final offer conclude the process.