Sr. / Staff Software Engineer, Data Lakehouse, Apple Data Platform

Summary

The Apple Data Platform team, part of the Services organization, powers analytics and machine learning across Apple. Our mission is to deliver cutting-edge, reliable, and user-friendly infrastructure for data ingestion, storage, processing, and interaction, enabling teams to build data-intensive applications with ease and success.
This role sits within the Data Lakehouse team, a part of the Apple Data Platform. The team provides a fully managed Lakehouse solution powered by Apache Iceberg, Iceberg REST Catalog, and custom-built services to manage data at scale. Our platform supports both analytical and machine learning workloads across Apple, serving key products and organizations including Siri, Search, Media, iCloud, News, Apple Intelligence, and Maps. We continuously innovate to meet evolving customer needs and market trends.
We seek engineers passionate about building world-class infrastructure products. In this role, you will lead the data lakehouse team, guiding team members in both technical and professional growth. You will collaborate closely with cross-functional teams to lead the planning, execution, and success of technical projects, with a focus on enhancing the experience for Apple’s internal customers.

Description

The ideal candidate will have outstanding communication skills, proven data infrastructure/platform design and implementation capabilities, strong business acumen, and an innate drive to deliver results. He/she will be a self-starter, comfortable with ambiguity and will enjoy working in a fast-paced dynamic environment.

Responsibilities

Build and operate Apple’s largest data platform supporting exabyte scale.
Scale and operationalize the largest custom build multi-tenant, highly secure, privacy enabled Data Lakehouse.
Ensure data platform offers reliable high quality data with consistent SLAs with good monitoring, alerting and incident response and continual investment to reduce tech-debt
Write code, documentation, participate in code reviews, and mentor other engineers

Minimum Qualifications

10+ years of experience in design and development of scaling, and operation of distributed systems, including technologies like Apache Spark, Kafka, Flink, and Iceberg, along with resource management systems like Kubernetes or AWS EKS.
Proficient in Java or Scala.
Proficient in Apache Iceberg and Iceberg Rest Catalog specification
Proven expertise in designing and developing scalable, reliable APIs.
A hands-on approach with a willingness to engage in daily technical work.
Contributions to Open-Source projects like Apache Iceberg are a plus.
Skilled at debugging complex issues in large-scale distributed systems.
Driven by a passion for building reliable, maintainable, and user-friendly products and services.
Exceptional communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to work effectively across multiple teams and functions.
Bachelor’s, Master’s, or Ph.D. in Computer Science or a related technical discipline.

Preferred Qualifications

Expertise in public cloud platform’s like AWS, S3, EKS, IAM.
Contributor to open source technologies like Spark or Iceberg.
Expertise in building Lakehouse for large scale data platforms.
Experience with development of Iceberg Rest Catalogs like Apache Polaris, Graviton etc.

Pay & Benefits — Seattle, Washington, United States

At Apple, base pay is one part of our total compensation package and is determined within a range. This provides the opportunity to progress as you grow and develop within a role. The base pay range for this role is between $175,000 and $308,500, and your base pay will depend on your skills, qualifications, experience, and location.

Apple employees also have the opportunity to become an Apple shareholder through participation in Apple’s discretionary employee stock programs. Apple employees are eligible for discretionary restricted stock unit awards, and can purchase Apple stock at a discount if voluntarily participating in Apple’s Employee Stock Purchase Plan. You’ll also receive benefits including: Comprehensive medical and dental coverage, retirement benefits, a range of discounted products and free services, and for formal education related to advancing your career at Apple, reimbursement for certain educational expenses — including tuition. Additionally, this role might be eligible for discretionary bonuses or commission payments as well as relocation. Learn more about Apple Benefits

Note: Apple benefit, compensation and employee stock programs are subject to eligibility requirements and other terms of the applicable plan or program.

Application Deadline

Apple accepts applications to this posting on an ongoing basis.