Position: Senior Big Data Engineer
Location
Hybrid in Rockville, MD (may also be open to their Virginia and NJ locations)
Duration
6 months; likely extensions (multi-year project)
Interview
2 rounds
Offer Notes
- Trino Big Data platform
- Happens through memory caching
- Modernizing the platform
- SQL • from trino to athena
- Provide solutions, evaluate the tech stack, move as tech moves
- Already developed an mcp agent/server • would be good if they had that experience
Preferred Locations (in order of priority)
- Rockville, MD location is preferred as first priority
- May be open to their Tysons Corner, VA location
- May be open to their Woodbridge, NJ location
- May be open to their Jersey City, NJ location
Job Description
Description
We are looking for a Senior Big Data Engineer who thinks beyond tickets and task execution. This role is for someone who questions the why, modernizes tech stacks, optimizes performance, and drives outcomes, not just a task executor.
What You'll Do
- Design and build scalable data lakes and pipelines on AWS using cloud-native and automated solutions.
- Enable fast, federated analytics using Amazon Athena and Trino, with performance tuning for large-scale queries.
- Manage metadata, schemas, and discovery using AWS Glue Data Catalog.
- Implement fine-grained data access and governance using AWS Lake Formation, KMS encryption, and SSL.
- Build and operate data services on EKS (Kubernetes).
- Work with the Hadoop ecosystem (Spark, Hive, HDFS) using partitioning, bucketing, and columnar formats (Parquet, ORC).
- Troubleshoot and resolve complex big data issues across pipelines, clusters, and queries.
- Design, implement, and maintain CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins or similar tools.
- Monitor and observe pipelines and clusters using CloudWatch and Grafana.
- Prepare high-quality datasets for AI/ML use cases.
- Build, configure, and operate an MCP server for AI/ML integration.
- Collaborate in Scrum teams; proactively identify gaps and propose out-of-the-box, scalable solutions.
What We're Looking For
- 8+ years of experience in Big Data / Data Engineering.
- Strong hands-on experience with AWS (S3, Glue Data Catalog, Lake Formation, Athena, EMR, EKS).
- Proven experience with Trino (or Presto) and optimizing query performance.
- Working knowledge of Kubernetes / EKS for data workloads.
- Strong SQL, Python, and shell scripting skills.
- Experience with CI/CD pipelines and Jenkins.
- Experience building and configuring MCP server for AI/ML integration.
- Ownership mindset • problem solver, not a task executor.
Required
Sr. Big Data Engineer • AWS, Hadoop, Athena, Glue (Catalog), Lake Formation, Trino, EKS, AI, CI/CD & MCP Server
Good to Have
- AI/ML data pipeline exposure
- Cloud-native data modernization experience
Apply to this job