Platform Engineer, E-Commerce, Search and AI

Job Title: Platform Engineer, E-Commerce, Search and AI

Location: Toronto, ON (Hybrid)

Estimated Duration: Full Time/Permanent

Overview
We're looking for an experienced and visionary Platform Engineer to lead the technical design and oversight of our core e-commerce search engine and AI application development initiatives. The ideal candidate will be a hands-on leader, shaping our technical roadmap, ensuring system scalability, performance, and reliability, and driving innovation in how customers discover products and interact with our intelligent systems. This role demands a deep understanding of complex search technologies, machine learning workflows, and high-volume, low-latency e-commerce platforms.
Responsibilities
Technical Strategy & Architecture

• Define the designs and technical standards for the e-commerce search platform (e.g., expertise in Google Vertex Ai search for commerce, and search capability like Bloomreach, Elastic Search or Solar would be valuable) and the associated AI/ML microservices (e.g., personalization, recommendation, natural language processing).
• Develop a strategic roadmap for the evolution of the application portfolio, focusing on scalability, resilience, and cloud-native patterns (e.g., microservices, serverless). Evaluate and recommend new technologies, frameworks, and tools to improve developer efficiency, system performance, and business outcomes.
• Ensure the designs align with security best practices, data privacy regulations, and governance policies.

Technical Leadership & Governance

• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to development and data science teams, ensuring adherence to the defined architecture and coding standards.
• Conduct regular technical design reviews, design sessions, and code audits to ensure the delivery of high-quality, maintainable software.
• Collaborate with Architects, Product Managers, Engineering Leads, and stakeholders to translate business requirements into robust, scalable technical solutions.
• Oversee performance testing and optimization efforts, particularly for search query response times and AI model inference latency.

E-commerce Search & AI Focus

• Design solutions to enhance search relevance, ranking algorithms, and user experience features (e.g., facets, filtering, autocomplete).
• Design and implement MLOps pipelines for the deployment, monitoring, and retraining of AI models, ensuring fast and reliable deployment cycles.
• Drive the integration of AI-powered features into the core e-commerce platform, focusing on measurable impact on conversion and revenue.

Qualifications
Required Experience

• 7+ years in software development with 3+ years in a Platform Engineering, Architecture, or equivalent leadership role.
• Proven experience designing and scaling high-traffic, low-latency e-commerce or equivalent transactional systems.
• Expert-level knowledge of distributed search engines (e.g., Elasticsearch, Solr) including indexing strategies, query optimization, and cluster management.
• Demonstrated experience with AI/ML application development and MLOps principles, including experience with major cloud AI services (e.g., AWS SageMaker, Google AI Platform, Azure ML).
• Deep expertise in cloud architecture on one or more major providers (Azure, GCP), utilizing services like containers (Kubernetes/Docker), serverless functions, and data stores.

Technical Skills

• Proficiency in at least one modern programming language relevant to e-commerce and AI (e.g., Python, Java, Go).
• Strong understanding of data modeling, database technologies (SQL and NoSQL), and data warehousing concepts.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, automated testing, and infrastructure-as-code (e.g., Terraform, CloudFormation).
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to articulate complex technical concepts to a non-technical audience.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• Experience in Natural Language Processing (NLP) or Recommendation Systems specifically within an e-commerce context.
• Certifications in cloud architecture (e.g., AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional).