Ludex

Principal Backend Engineer|Architect Location: Chicago, IL (Hybrid – 1 day/week in-office) Contracted to Full Time Experienced Company: Ludex, Inc. About Ludex Ludex is a consumer-facing technology platform transforming the sports and trading card hobby through AI-driven scanning, data, and marketplace tools. We build products used by millions of collectors and enterprise sellers, and we move fast. If you thrive in a startup environment where ownership, velocity, and impact matter, you’ll feel at home here. Role Overview We are seeking a hands-on Principal Engineer to help design, build, and scale the backend systems that power Ludex’s consumer and Enterprise products. This role is ideal for an experienced engineer who enjoys building high-performance, scalable applications, working close to the product, and operating with an entrepreneurial mindset. You will play a critical role in architecture decisions, performance optimization, and the evolution of our platform as we scale users, data volume, and revenue. This role requires a high level of ownership and autonomy. You will be responsible for making key backend architecture decisions and driving execution in a fast-moving startup environment. Key Responsibilities - Design, develop, and maintain scalable backend services using Node.js, NestJS, and TypeScript - Build and optimize APIs that support consumer-facing products and enterprise workflows - Design, manage, and optimize PostgreSQL databases and data models for performance and reliability - Work with AWS infrastructure (e.g., EC2, RDS, S3, Lambda, CloudWatch, etc.) - Collaborate closely with frontend engineers, product, and other teams to deliver end-to-end features - Ensure high standards for code quality, efficiency, security, and performance - Identify and resolve performance bottlenecks across services and databases - Participate in architecture discussions and contribute to long-term technical strategy - Support deployments, monitoring, and system reliability in production environments - Thrive in a fast-paced startup environment, balancing speed with sound engineering judgment Required Qualifications - 7+ years of professional backend engineering experience - Strong proficiency with Node.js and TypeScript - Hands-on experience with NestJS or similar backend frameworks - Deep experience working with relational databases, particularly PostgreSQL - Proven experience building and scaling consumer-facing applications - Experience working with AWS in production environments - Strong understanding of API design, data modeling, and system architecture - Ability to write clean, efficient, maintainable, and well-tested code - Strong ability to independently evaluate technical approaches and make architecture decisions in a startup environment. - Proven experience owning backend systems end-to-end, including design, implementation, deployment, and ongoing evolution. - Comfortable working in ambiguous, fast-moving environments with evolving requirements - Strong communication skills and a collaborative mindset Nice to Have - DevOps experience, including CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure-as-code, or deployment automation - Experience with system monitoring, observability, and performance tuning - Experience supporting high-scale or data-intensive applications - Prior startup or high-growth company experience Work Environment - Hybrid role: must be able to work in-office in Chicago at least 1 day per week - Collaborative, hands-on engineering culture - Small team, high ownership, and real influence on product direction Why Ludex - Build products used by millions of passionate collectors - High-impact role with real ownership and visibility - Opportunity to shape architecture and engineering standards - Fast-moving, entrepreneurial environment without heavy bureaucracy