Associate Software Engineer (Java)

About Us

Sage Bionetworks uses open science and collaboration to improve human health. We turn complex biomedical data into actionable insights through responsible sharing, strong governance, and innovative tools like AI. Our team values curiosity, diverse perspectives, and experimentation.

The Opportunity

We are hiring a Backend Software Engineer to join our technology team. Our engineers build the secure, scalable, and high-performance services that power open and collaborative science. From Synapse.org to our research portals and other applications in the Sage ecosystem, the tools you create will enable researchers and communities worldwide to share data, generate insights, and accelerate biomedical discoveries.

We pride ourselves on openness and collaboration.  All of our software is available in GitHub.  Our openness and non-profit status attracts support from a variety of collaborators, including major technology companies.  We prioritize productivity over arbitrary rules, allowing workers to choose the tools and work habits that suit them best, rather than dictating practices, top down. We prioritize software usefulness and stability rather than rushing to get features out the door.  We have close relationships with our user base, many in-house, ensuring that we stay relevant.

Key Responsibilities

• Software Development: Contribute to the implementation of cutting-edge applications using programming languages and tools to create functional and efficient software. The main language used in this position is Java, though occasionally a project requires using another prominent language, like Python.
• Cloud Computing: Our platform runs primarily in the AWS Cloud and uses a large variety of services, from fundamentals like S3, EC2 and CloudWatch to newer offerings like Bedrock.  
• Requirement Analysis: Analyze user requirements to develop robust and efficient software solutions.
• Teamwork: Our team follows an Agile process with scrums, issue scoping, backlog prioritization, and code reviews.  You will work with product managers and designers.
• DevOps: You will participate in monitoring the performance of the system and addressing issues that arise in production.  Over the past 15 years we have not required developers to be on call outside of business hours and are intentional about making our system robust so that it does not become necessary. 
• Technical Documentation: Provide comprehensive technical documentation to support users and developers.
• Productivity: Stay current regarding engineering productivity tools, include recent trends in AI/agent-based tools.

Qualifications

Education

• A BS in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent training.

Experience

• Some software development experience, especially working in a team setting and delivering a finished product.
• Solid Java programming skills, plus experience with another modern language (e.g., Python, TypeScript/Node.js).
• Expertise with collaborative development through Git-based version control systems.
• Practical experience with software development lifecycles,agile methodologies, and tools for organizing/prioritizing work, like Jira.
• Experience with agentic code generation tools.
• Strong verbal, written, and organizational skills.
• Curiosity to explore new tools and frameworks and contribute ideas that advance our technology.

Nice to Have

• Familiarity with dependency management / build tools, including Maven.
• Familiarity with continuous integration (CI), continuous deployment (CD) tools e.g., GitHub Workflows, AWS Code Pipeline.

Job Functions and Physical Requirements

The following cognitive and physical activities outline the essential functions required for successful job performance. Reasonable accommodations may be provided to enable individuals with disabilities to fulfill these functions.

Physical Demands

• Extended periods of sitting at a desk and using a computer.
• Repeated wrist, hand, and finger movements.