Data Platform Engineer (Python)

New York

**About The Role** What if your Python expertise could directly shape the infrastructure powering next-generation AI? We're looking for a Senior Python Full-Stack Engineer to build and optimize the data pipelines, annotation tooling, and evaluation systems that leading AI labs depend on to train and improve their models. This is a fully remote contract role working on real production systems --- not toy projects. You'll be embedded alongside data, research, and engineering teams doing meaningful, high-visibility work at the frontier of AI development. * Organization: Alignerr * Type: Hourly Contract * Location: Remote * Commitment: 20--40 hours/week **What You'll Do** * Design, build, and optimize high-performance Python systems supporting large-scale AI data pipelines and evaluation workflows * Develop full-stack tooling and backend services for data annotation, validation, and quality control * Identify and fix bottlenecks, edge cases, and reliability issues across production Python codebases * Collaborate directly with data, research, and engineering teams to support model training and benchmarking * Participate in synchronous design reviews to iterate on architecture and implementation decisions * Improve performance, safety, and scalability across existing infrastructure **Who You Are** * Native or fluent English speaker with clear written and verbal communication skills * 5+ years of professional experience writing production-grade Python for data engineering * Strong full-stack developer background with solid systems programming fundamentals * Proficient with workflow orchestration tools for managing complex dependency graphs * Experienced with dataframe processing libraries and cloud data warehouse SDKs * Able to commit reliably to 20--40 hours per week **Nice to Have** * Prior experience with data annotation, data quality pipelines, or evaluation systems * Familiarity with AI/ML workflows, model training, or benchmarking infrastructure * Experience with distributed systems or developer tooling **Why Join Us** * Work on cutting-edge AI projects alongside leading research labs at the frontier of the field * Fully remote and flexible --- work from wherever you do your best thinking * Freelance autonomy with the structure and consistency of meaningful, ongoing technical work * Make a direct, tangible impact on the systems that shape how AI models learn and improve * Potential for extended engagement and expanded scope as projects evolve