Geospatial & AI Tools Engineer

Geospatial & AI Tools Engineer

(Remote-first, must reside in an ESA-member country)

We’re looking for a senior Geospatial & AI Tools Engineer to help us build meaningful tools for partners such as ESA, NASA, ECMWF, and The Nature Conservancy, making Earth observation data more accessible and enabling open science. We're growing our Europe-based team and looking for a software engineer comfortable working across cloud-native geospatial pipelines and AI-driven data tools.

As part of this team, you'll scale cloud-native Earth observation services by streamlining ingestion pipelines and optimizing geospatial data workflows. You’ll deliver robust AI-driven tools by strengthening interactive applications leveraging large language models (LLMs) and building reliable workflows resistant to inaccuracies. You'll be an essential contributor, combining geospatial knowledge with backend engineering excellence and a user-focused product mindset. 

Development Seed is a unique and rewarding place to do this work. Over the past two decades, we have honed our approach to stewarding projects with our partners from opportunity to successful, impactful products. Our technical teams are built of curious, empathetic people with high intrinsic motivation and a growth mindset. We open-source a lot of our work, invest heavily in R&D that drives the field, and regularly reinvent the nature of our work.

This is a remote-first position; you must be located in and authorized to work in one of the ESA member states. You will be working on our EU-based projects while also collaborating with our global team.

What You'll Do

• Develop scalable geospatial services — write clean Python code, architect data services leveraging formats like STAC, Zarr, and Cloud-Optimized GeoTIFFs (COGs), and deploy services on cloud platforms like AWS, GCP, or Azure
  
  
• Engineer AI-driven backend systems — build robust inference and retrieval pipelines, integrate vector search, manage prompt engineering, and ensure responses are reliable and accurate
  
  
• Transform algorithms into user-centric workflows — turn research prototypes into maintainable, test-covered services aligned with real user needs
  
  
• Collaborate openly — engage with communities like GeoZarr, participate in open-source projects, write clear documentation, and contribute to community discussions and standards
  
  
• Mentor and document — support team growth by sharing knowledge, documenting architecture decisions, and advocating for sustainable software practices.

What We're Looking For

• 5+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 3 years focusing on geospatial or data-intensive backend systems
  
  
• Expertise in Python — strong proficiency with libraries such as Xarray, Zarr, GDAL, or rio-tiler, backed by experience in rigorous testing and CI practices
  
  
• Cloud-native experience — comfortable deploying services using Docker, Kubernetes, infrastructure as code (Terraform/CDK), and at least one major cloud provider (AWS, GCP, Azure)
  
  
• Experience developing AI-driven tools — familiarity with integrating or building chat and search interfaces, using LLMs for orchestration, vector databases, embedding models, or retrieval-augmented generation (e.g., LangChain, LlamaIndex)
  
  
• Strong product and communication skills — ability to think strategically beyond tickets, clearly communicate decisions in pull requests, and discuss technical trade-offs effectively with colleagues and partners
  
  
• EU/ESA work authorization, comfortable collaborating asynchronously across multiple time zones

Nice to have

• Contributions to open-source geospatial or AI projects
  
  
• Experience evaluating and improving retrieval-augmented generation pipelines (quality assessment, guardrails, and iterative improvement)
  
  
• Familiarity with scientific computing UX (JupyterHub, Binder, etc.)
  
  
• Experience engaging with the broader open-source community through talks, blogs, or forums

How We Work

• We collaborate in the open — clear GitHub issues, thoughtful Slack conversations, and supportive code reviews
  
  
• We care about the work and each other — sharing ideas, giving feedback, and investing in team growth
  
  
• We build sustainably — focusing on quality, longevity, and impact, not just delivery speed
  
  
• We care about the real world — our work supports science, sustainability, and public good

The Hiring Process

We have a comprehensive 5 step hiring process, designed to be thorough and engaging to ensure that you and our team have a clear understanding of how we can succeed together:

1. Application review
2. Introductory interview to get to know each other (30 minutes)
3. Technical interview to talk about your skills for this position, prior experience, and answer hypothetical questions about how you’d approach future projects (1 hour)
4. Team fit interview to align with our team's culture and your longer term career goals (30 minutes)
5. Paid full day virtual interview activity for you to collaborate directly with our team members (8 hours)

If this role sounds exciting but you’re not sure you check every box, we encourage you to apply. We’re looking for thoughtful and motivated engineers who want to grow and contribute.

Development Seed takes embracing differences and providing fair opportunities seriously. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. The more inclusive we are, the better our work will be.