Staff Backend Engineer - New Products (USA) at Kalepa

New York, New York, United States -

Full Time

Start Date

Immediate

Expiry Date

17 Mar, 26

Salary

235000.0

Posted On

17 Dec, 25

Experience

10 year(s) or above

Remote Job

Yes

Telecommute

Yes

Sponsor Visa

Skills

Software Engineering, Python, System Design, Debugging, Problem Solving, Serverless Technologies, Asynchronous Workflows, Cloud Environments, Relational Databases, PostgreSQL, Experimentation, Communication, Ownership, LLMs, Generative AI, Distributed Systems

Industry

Insurance

Description

About Kalepa: Commercial insurance is a trillion-dollar industry run out of Microsoft Outlook. Kalepa is upending this. Our state-of-the-art AI Copilot platform empowers underwriters to make smarter, faster, and more accurate decisions. Our AI is designed to deliver real results - insurers literally see massive improvements to their top and bottom lines as soon as they implement Copilot. That’s why our clients call Copilot “truly an underwriter’s dream” and proclaim that Copilot helps them “almost double the amount of accounts they can look at in the day." Kalepa's team members bring experience from top technology companies, including Facebook, Google, Amazon, Mastercard, and Uber. Kalepa is backed by leading VCs like IA Ventures and Inspired Capital. Our Values (This is important): Many organizations have a dusty list of corporate values that no one ever follows. Kalepa is not one of those companies. Our values are designed to unlock the potential of our employees. Success at Kalepa is bred from five core principles: Hustle & Grit - We expect everyone at Kalepa to be excellent at what they do and relentless in pursuing their craft. There are no easy days. Kalepa’s exceptional speed and determination are our biggest differentiators: this is how we win. Customer Focus - We will ruthlessly prioritize the work that drives our clients’ growth, profitability, and efficiency. We are not building things just because they seem cool - we are here to solve our customers’ most strategic problems. Meritocracy - Too many exceptional people are stifled by corporate bureaucracies. At Kalepa, those people excel - and we reward tremendous results with rapid promotions and compensation growth. Transparency - We are honest with each other. We don’t believe in back-office politics and keeping employees in the dark. Transparency allows us to instantly cut to the heart of the matter and figure it out together. Experimentation - For many of the problems we face, no company has ever solved them before. We tackle these by quickly testing, measuring, and iterating to determine the path to success. In addition to our NY office, we have remote employees speaking 10+ languages across the globe. But we invest in bringing our people together both for regional meetups and global offsites (2021 - Playa Del Carmen | 2022 - Rome | 2023 - Buenos Aires | 2024 - Lisbon | 2025 - Cartagena). Kalepa’s culture isn’t for everyone, and that’s ok. But for the people who are a fit, they can’t imagine working elsewhere. About the role: Salary range: $200k – $235k USD* We are looking for smart engineers who love to code, seek challenging problems, and appreciate recognition for excellent work. As part of the New Products team, you will help bring an entirely new suite of capabilities into our product. Your work will range from building quick prototypes to preparing polished feature demos that showcase what’s possible. You’ll iterate rapidly, test ideas early, and embrace a “move fast and break things” mindset to explore new opportunities. This role involves experimenting with features that can expand our total addressable market, validating assumptions, and turning promising concepts into practical, shippable solutions. You'll join a small, high-ownership group with the autonomy to drive innovation and directly influence how AI transforms an entire industry. Your contributions will have an outsized impact on both our technology and our business. You'll be right at home if you: Have 8+ years of software engineering experience, ideally with time spent building features from the ground up. Embody hustle and grit, you're excellent at your craft and relentless in pursuing it. Take full ownership of your work and drive projects to completion with minimal oversight. Communicate proactively, surfacing blockers, asking the right questions, keeping stakeholders in the loop. Thrive on experimentation: you're comfortable testing ideas, measuring results, and iterating quickly on problems no one has solved before. Have strong fundamentals in system design, debugging, and problem-solving. Know Python (our main stack), though we're open to strong candidates from other OO backgrounds. Have experience with serverless technologies (Lambda, EC2), asynchronous workflows, and cloud environments. Are comfortable with relational databases, ideally PostgreSQL. Bonus: experience with LLMs/generative AI, distributed systems. What you’ll get: Competitive salary (based on experience level)*. Significant equity options package. Work with an ambitious, smart, global, and fun team to transform a $1T global industry. 20 days of PTO a year. Global team offsites. Gym reimbursement. Phone reimbursement. Student stipend. *The salary range listed is an estimate and will vary based on a variety of factors. Final compensation will be determined during the offer stage based on relevant experience, performance during the interview process, and geographic location, and may therefore differ from the posted range.

Responsibilities

As part of the New Products team, you will help bring new capabilities into the product, ranging from building prototypes to polished feature demos. You will iterate rapidly, test ideas early, and explore new opportunities to expand the total addressable market.