Inference Software Engineer

The job

LIVE Employer public job feed (private-sector employer) Source: the employer's public careers feed · Data: listed 2025-06-17

Job description

About Etched

Etched is building hardware for frontier intelligence. We co-design chips, racks, software, and manufacturing to deliver best-in-class throughput and latency across both prefill and decode workloads. Our first products are heavily focused on inference. Backed by hundreds of millions from top-tier investors and staffed by leading engineers, Etched is redefining the infrastructure layer for the fastest growing industry in history.

Key responsibilities

• Support porting state-of-the-art models to our architecture. Help build programming abstractions and testing capabilities to rapidly iterate on model porting.

• Build, enhance, and scale our runtime, including multi-node inference, intra-node execution, state management, and robust error handling.

• Optimize routing and communication layers using our collectives.

• Utilize performance profiling and debugging tools to identify bottlenecks and correctness issues.

You may be a good fit if you have

• Proficiency in C++ or Rust.

• Understanding of performance-sensitive or complex distributed software systems like Linux internals, accelerator architectures (e.g. GPUs, TPUs), Compilers, or high-speed interconnects (e.g. NVLink, InfiniBand).

• Familiarity with PyTorch or JAX.

• Ported applications to non-standard accelerator hardware or hardware platforms.

Strong candidates may also have experience with (Nice-to-have qualifications)

• Developed low-latency, high-performance applications using both kernel-level and user-space networking stacks.

• Deep understanding of distributed systems concepts, algorithms, and challenges, including consensus protocols, consistency models, and communication patterns.

• Solid grasp of Transformer architectures, particularly Mixture-of-Experts (MoE).

• Built applications with extensive SIMD (Single Instruction, Multiple Data) optimizations for performance-critical paths.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision packages with generous premium coverage

  • $500 per month credit for waiving medical benefits

• Housing subsidy of $2.5k per month for those living within walking distance of the office

• Relocation support for those moving to San Jose (Santana Row)

• Various wellness benefits covering fitness, mental health, and more

• Daily lunch + dinner in our office

• Unlimited compute budget subject to ROI justification

How we’re different

Etched believes in the Bitter Lesson. We are the first inference-focused frontier AI system. Our addressable market is the entirety of inference, unlike many of our competitors.

We are a fully in-person team in San Jose (Santana Row), and greatly value engineering skills. We do not have boundaries between engineering and research, and we expect all of our technical staff to contribute to both and work across disciplines as needed.

Explore around this job

Field: Technology Sub-niche: Software engineering All jobs at Etched Jobs in California Jobs in San Jose, CA San Jose city guide California state guide Santa Clara County economy

View this job and apply on the employer's page →

You apply on the employer's page; AtiveSite does not receive or process applications and is not affiliated with the employer. The description above is shown as the source published it.

About the role

This is a — role in the Technology field (Software engineering) at Etched.

We could not match this job title to one occupation in the official wage statistics, so no pay estimate is shown. Pay is not in the source listing; ask the employer for the range and compare in the 240 job niches.

Does the pay work here? (estimate)

How to prepare and behave

This is editorial guidance, not information from the employer.

• Read the whole description and match your examples to its requirements; use the same words the posting uses where they are true for you.
• Research the employer before the interview: what it does, who its customers are and recent news; prepare two or three questions about the work.
• Arrive early (or log in early for a video call), dress one step above the daily dress code, and test your camera and audio beforehand.
• Answer with short stories: the situation, what you did and the result. Give numbers when you have them and never invent them.
• Be honest about gaps; say what you did to learn and how fast you can close them.
• Ask about the team, the first 90 days, how success is measured and the schedule; do not open with salary and time off.
• When pay comes up, know the market range for the occupation and your lowest acceptable offer before you answer; ask for the full package in writing.
• Send a short thank-you message within a day, mentioning one thing you discussed.
• Have code, data work or projects you can show, and be ready to think aloud: many technical interviews test how you reason, not only the answer.

Know your rights as a candidate and an employee:

• U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission: prohibited employment practices
• U.S. Department of Labor: Wage and Hour Division
• CareerOneStop (U.S. Department of Labor): job search help, interview tips and resumes
• USA.gov: avoiding job scams

The city

The job is in San Jose, CA. Below is what the official statistics say about living and working there.

How San Jose compares. Among the 145 largest places in California, San Jose is #3 by population, #30 for household income (#1 = highest), #110 for rent (#1 = cheapest), #48 for college degrees (#1 = most). Its county, Santa Clara County, is #1 of 58 counties for average pay ($197,043).

The place in numbers

San Jose has 990,138 residents (ACS 2020–2024), about 2.5% of the population of California. It covers 178 square miles of land, which works out to roughly 5,564 people per square mile. The median age is 38.2, about the same as the state median (38.2 against 37.9).

Housing

The median gross rent is $2,669 a month (rent plus utilities), 31% above the state median ($2,669 against $2,036). Over a year that is 21.9% of the median household income. US housing guidance treats housing as affordable when it takes 30% of income or less, so the typical household is under that line. The median home value is $1,233,200, which is 8.4 times the median household income ($146,427); a ratio above 5 usually means buying is out of reach without savings or a second income. 55.8% of households own their home, about the same as the state average (55.8% against 55.9%).

Work and pay

The San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA metropolitan area has 1,134,970 jobs in the BLS wage survey, and the median pay across all occupations is $84,050 a year, 65% above the national median ($84,050 against $50,980). The biggest occupation groups are computer and mathematical (149,970 jobs, median $186,320); management (115,110 jobs, median $210,750); business and financial operations (94,210 jobs, median $125,240). The area is most specialised in computer and mathematical (3.9 times) and architecture and engineering (2.5 times), where the share of workers is well above the national share. The best-paying groups with at least 5,000 jobs are management ($210,750) and legal ($195,190). In 2026M09 the unemployment rate of Santa Clara County was 4.2%. 67.6% of residents aged 16 and over are in the labour force. The city lies in Santa Clara County; its jobs, pay by industry and GDP are on the county page.

Getting around

Among workers, 62.9% drive alone, 2.4% use public transit, 1.8% walk, 20.3% work from home. 15.3% of workers commute 45 minutes or more, 21% below the state average (15.3% against 19.4%).

People and education

47.3% of adults aged 25 and over hold a bachelor's degree or higher, 28% above the state share (47.3% against 37.1%). 42.0% of residents were born outside the United States, 56% above the state share (42.0% against 27.0%). The poverty rate is 8.1%, 32% below the state rate (8.1% against 12.0%).

Climate

The warmest month is Aug, averaging 68°F (19.8°C), and the coolest is Jan at 47°F (8.3°C). About 510 mm (20 inches) of precipitation falls in a year; Dec is the wettest month (114 mm) and Jul the driest (0 mm). These values come from NASA satellite-based climatology on a grid of about 50 km, so they describe the wider area, not a weather station in the city.

Nearby cities to compare

Closest cities in this guide: Campbell (8 miles, similar rent); Los Gatos (9 miles, rent 22% higher); Santa Clara (10 miles, rent 13% higher); Milpitas (10 miles, rent 17% higher). Rent differences are against San Jose; use the Compare tab to put any two cities side by side.

Full guide to San Jose →California guideAll jobs in San Jose

Official links for San Jose

• Census Bureau data profile for San Jose
• Official website of Santa Clara County: santaclaracounty.gov
• Official state website: ca.gov
• BLS Economy at a Glance: California

These links go to official sources and open in a new window. The first one is the government's or company's own site as listed in Wikidata (property "official website"); check it before relying on it.

Where to live

CITY Official statistics Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year (via Census Reporter) · Data: ACS 2020–2024

Places within 50 miles (straight line) of San Jose, CA that have a guide, with what living there costs. No pay estimate is shown because the title did not match one occupation.

Career paths

We could not match this title to one occupation, so here are the other sub-niches in Technology, where your skills may carry over:

Cybersecurity (762) Data, analytics and AI (3719) Cloud, IT and infrastructure (1147) Product management (927)

Distances

CITY Calculation (straight line) Source: U.S. Census Bureau Gazetteer (coordinates) · Data: 2024

How far San Jose, CA is from the 20 largest US cities, in straight-line miles (not driving distance). Click a column to sort.

Nearby cities with open jobs (within 120 miles)

The employer

Etched is the employer in this listing. See all its open jobs here →

We do not hold headcount or revenue for this employer. Check its careers site and, if it is listed on a stock exchange, its public filings (SEC EDGAR search).

What it is like to work at a company (culture, schedules, benefits) is not in the source data, so we do not describe it. Read the description and ask the questions under "How to prepare".

Other open jobs at Etched

Similar jobs

Same sub-niche: Software engineering

More jobs in San Jose, CA

All Software engineering jobs → · All Technology sub-niches →

FAQ

What is the Inference Software Engineer job at Etched?

A private-sector role in technology (software engineering) listed 510 days ago. The full description is on this page and on the employer's page.

Where is this job?

San Jose, CA.

How do I apply?

Use the "View this job and apply on the employer's page" button. AtiveSite does not receive applications.

How much does it pay?

The listing does not publish pay, and we could not match the title to one official occupation.

What is the cost of living there?

Median rent in San Jose is $2,669 a month and median household income $146,427 (ACS 2020–2024).

How old is this listing?

It was posted on 2025-06-17 (510 days ago). Jobs older than 90 days are not shown.

Are there similar jobs?

Yes: browse software engineering jobs in California.

Sources and terms

• Job data: Etched careers page public feed (listing dated 2025-06-17). The job disappears from this site when it disappears from the source.
• Wages and projections: BLS OEWS (May 2025) and Employment Projections 2025–35.
• City and county figures: Census Bureau ACS 2020–2024, BEA, BLS QCEW and LAUS, NASA POWER climatology; distances from Census Gazetteer coordinates.

AtiveSite is not affiliated with or endorsed by the employer or any government agency, and does not process applications. Verify every detail with the employer before acting.

Sources

• BLS OEWS (wages and employment by occupation, May 2025)
• BLS Employment Projections 2025–35
• BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics
• BLS JOLTS
• BLS State and Metro Area Employment
• Census Bureau American Community Survey (via Census Reporter)
• BEA GDP by state and Regional Price Parities
• IRS 2026 tax adjustments
• U.S. Department of Labor, minimum wage by state
• Tax Foundation state income tax rates 2026
• USAJOBS
• USCIS
• U.S. Department of State, visas
• NASA POWER climatology
• GeoNames / Census Gazetteer (coordinates)