Vannevar Labs
Vannevar is a defense technology company building AI to deter our adversaries. In the 21st century, conflict moves at algorithmic speed and foresight equals firepower. Our agentic AI is purpose-built to compete with China—from cross-Strait conflict to gray zone coercion. Trained on the most mission-relevant datasets in defense, our technology models adversary behavior, simulates campaigns, and recommends the best course of action to decision makers. Our AI systems are some of the most trusted in the industry and actively used on the front lines of the Indo-Pacific to keep the peace and save lives.
Exceptional technology starts with exceptional people. Vannevar is a small agile team combining world-class engineers with veteran strategists who bring deep expertise in defense and tradecraft. We’re building a company defined by mission impact, user empathy, and disciplined growth. In just three years, we grew from $3M to $80M in ARR, achieved early profitability, and reached unicorn status—proving that disruption doesn’t require an ego, and staying power doesn’t mean standing still.
About the role
Search is at the heart of Vannevar’s flagship platform and agentic workflows. We are seeking a Senior Software Engineer, with substantial knowledge and passion for search and information retrieval, to drive innovation in this space. In this role, you will work directly with our ML and product teams to advance a state-of-the-art search system that fundamentally drives our users’ ability to surface mission critical information.
What you’ll do
- Design and adapt the technical strategy for search within Vannevar’s products, including how we leverage full-text search, vector databases, LLMs, NLP, and relevance algorithms
- Improve both search latency and relevance
- Collaborate with product engineers, designers, and mission strategists to translate user needs into data-informed search innovations
- Research and apply emerging technologies, trends and best practices in the search/information retrieval domain to improve index quality, freshness, and retrieval performance
What we’re looking for
- You have 7+ years of experience in backend software development, with 3+ years in search, information retrieval, or related fields
- You have a passion for architecting, developing and deploying reliable, scalable, and performant systems
- You have expertise in information retrieval, NLP, and machine learning. You have a deep understanding of concepts like indexing, ranking, query parsing, tokenization, and vector search.
- You have hands-on experience with at least one major search engine (e.g., Elasticsearch, OpenSearch), and familiarity with search evaluation frameworks (e.g., precision, recall, NDCG).
- You have excellent analytical, problem-solving, leadership, and communication skills.
- U.S. Person status is required as this position will require the ability to access U.S. only data systems.
What we offer
Competitive Salary
The salary range for this position is $150,000 – $215,000 + equity. Within the range, individual pay is determined by experience, relevant education, and/or training.
Comprehensive Benefits
- Health, dental, and vision insurance
- Remote friendly with WeWork access
- Unlimited PTO, shared downtime during the federal holiday calendar, and company-wide off time at the end of each year
- 401(k) match
- Lifestyle & wellbeing stipends
- Salary top-up during military reserve duty
- Fully paid parental leave
- Child and pet care reimbursement during travel
We are committed to protecting the privacy of all applicants. Official emails from the company will come from an @vannevarlabs.com domain. Under no circumstances will a legitimate representative from our company contact you to request passwords, financial information, or other sensitive personal data. Please be vigilant of potential scams.
Originally posted on Himalayas
To apply for this job please visit himalayas.app.
Working in United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic consisting of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguous states border Canada to the north and Mexico to the south, with the semi-exclave of Alaska in the northwest and the archipelago of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. The United States also asserts sovereignty over five major island territories and various uninhabited islands in Oceania and the Caribbean. It is a megadiverse country, with the world's th
More jobs at Vannevar Labs
Keep exploring on Get A Job.ai
Not quite the right fit? Your next opportunity is a click away.
- Browse all jobs
- More jobs by category
- Remote jobs you can do from anywhere
- Research typical pay for this role
- Set a job alert so new matches reach you first
- Upload your resume to apply faster
Hiring instead? Post a job and reach candidates searching right now.