Senior Backend Engineer – Ads Platform

Company Overview

Bolt is pioneering a future where urban environments prioritize people over cars. Established in 2013 by a young entrepreneur, Bolt has expanded into a global mobility platform serving over 200 million users and 4.5 million drivers and couriers in 50 countries. Our services encompass ride-hailing, food delivery, and micromobility options such as scooters, e-bikes, and car-sharing. Our agile, autonomous teams combine startup speed and ownership with the scale of a globally supported technology company, boasting over €1 billion in funding.

Why Work at Bolt?

• Contribute to shaping the future of urban mobility, transforming city living and transportation.
• Address large-scale challenges across technology, operations, regulations, and business growth.
• Experience early ownership in a lean, small-team environment where your decisions impact from day one, working alongside industry experts.
• Join a leading European technology company backed by premier investors including Sequoia.

Role Overview

We are crafting an advertising and monetization platform that empowers merchants and brands to connect with customers via sponsored listings, banners, and targeted promotions across Bolt Food. As a Backend Engineer, you will take charge in developing the critical backend systems enabling Ads — from scalable services for ad serving, bidding, and pricing to seamless integration of sponsored content into current ranking and delivery systems. Your work will include designing efficient APIs, real-time decision-making systems, and data pipelines that ensure relevant, effective, and well-integrated advertisements.

This foundational role involves early involvement in defining the Ads & Monetization platform’s architecture, establishing best engineering practices, and collaborating closely with Product, Data Science, and Engineering teams to build scalable products aligned with business growth.

Key Responsibilities

• Engineer, architect, and maintain scalable, low-latency services for ad serving, auctions, bidding, and pricing within Bolt Food.
• Embed sponsored listings, banner ads, and targeted promotions into Bolt’s existing ranking and delivery frameworks.
• Develop real-time decision engines and data pipelines for ad targeting, relevance, budget control, and campaign analytics while ensuring precise billing and expenditure tracking.
• Design robust, high-performance APIs serving merchants, advertisers, and internal users.
• Lead the technical roadmap and set engineering standards within the Ads & Monetization domain as a founding engineer.
• Collaborate across Product, Data Science, and Commerce teams to bring ad features from concept through launch.

Candidate Profile

• Proven experience in backend development with a history of delivering scalable, reliable, and high-throughput systems.
• Prior exposure to advertising platforms, real-time bidding/auctions, marketplaces, or recommendation systems is highly advantageous.
• Strong familiarity with microservice architecture, API design, algorithms, data structures, and performance optimization with attention to latency considerations.
• Knowledge in event streaming, data pipeline construction, or experimentation methodologies (A/B testing) is a plus.
• Empathy towards stakeholders and users, thriving in environments with rapid feedback loops.
• Previous experience with technical leadership or serving as a tech lead is a bonus.

Benefits and Culture

• Grow professionally with unique opportunities as a founding engineer of an innovative product.
• Receive competitive compensation alongside stock options aligning your success with Bolt’s growth.
• Access wellness benefits supporting both physical and mental health.
• Earn a one-month fully paid sabbatical after five years at Bolt.
• Participate in annual company-wide events and frequent smaller team activities.
• Enjoy a hybrid work model balancing flexibility and at least 12 in-office days each month for collaboration.

Use of AI

At Bolt, daily use of AI tools is standard practice to enhance work efficiency and quality, while maintaining high performance and responsibility for outcomes.

Diversity and Inclusion

Bolt is an equal opportunity employer dedicated to fostering a diverse, inclusive workplace. All qualified candidates will be considered regardless of race, color, nationality, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, or disability. Reasonable accommodations are available during the hiring process upon request.