Satellites generate an almost absurd amount of data every single day, and most of it is useless until someone builds the software that turns raw signal into something a person can actually act on. That someone is who this role is looking for.
You would join a team that builds and maintains the software behind satellite data products, working entirely remotely with no office tied to the position and no particular country or city required. Wherever you already live and work is fine, as long as the internet connection holds up for the occasional video call.
This is a full-time role, so the expectation is real, sustained focus, not a handful of hours squeezed in around other commitments. That said, the day itself is yours to structure, since most collaboration happens on a schedule you help shape rather than a fixed office clock.
This is a genuinely collaborative environment, but it is not a place where every decision gets made by committee. You will get real ownership over the systems you build, and with that comes real accountability when something breaks. Most people who thrive here like that trade.
Communication happens mostly in writing, through code reviews, design docs, and async updates, with a smaller number of live calls reserved for things that actually benefit from real-time back and forth. If you write clearly, you will do well here regardless of how introverted or extroverted you happen to be.
Feedback tends to be direct but kind, focused on the work rather than the person. A code review here reads more like a colleague thinking out loud with you than a gatekeeper deciding whether your work is good enough to exist.
The subject matter itself keeps people engaged longer than a typical backend role might. There is something satisfying about knowing the data flowing through your code originated hundreds of kilometers overhead.
You will also get exposure to the broader product side occasionally, sitting in on a call where someone explains how a customer actually uses the data your team produces. Seeing that connection makes the debugging work feel less abstract, since a fixed pipeline translates into a real decision someone else gets to make with better information.
A bachelor's degree in computer science, software engineering, or a related field is the standard requirement here, paired with demonstrated experience working with satellite data specifically. A portfolio of relevant projects genuinely helps, since it lets a hiring manager see your thinking rather than just your résumé.
Proficiency with modern development tools matters too, from your editor and terminal setup to whatever continuous-integration process the team relies on to catch problems before they reach production. None of it needs to match exactly what this particular team uses, but the general habits should already be there.
Two years of hands-on experience is what is being asked for, 24 months if you prefer to think of it that way. That is enough time to have built real muscle memory around debugging production issues, not just coursework familiarity.
Nice to have, not required: exposure to geospatial libraries, cloud infrastructure experience, or prior work with remote sensing datasets specifically. If you have touched any of these, mention it, it will get read closely.
If your background is general software engineering without the satellite-specific piece, that is not automatically disqualifying, as long as the fundamentals are strong and you can point to something that shows fast learning on unfamiliar domains. Plenty of good engineers picked up satellite data specifics on the job rather than beforehand.
Here is a small, real example of the kind of thing you would touch: a pipeline that ingests raw imagery starts silently dropping frames after a satellite firmware update changes a timestamp format slightly. Nobody notices for two days because the output still looks plausible. You would be the one who eventually catches the mismatch, traces it back to the timestamp change, and ships a fix that also adds an alert so it gets caught in minutes next time, not days.
That mix of curiosity and stubbornness tends to describe the people who do well here. Bugs in this kind of system rarely announce themselves loudly. More often they hide quietly in an edge case until a downstream team notices a report looks slightly off, and someone has to work backward from there.
The salary for this role sits at 97,000 dollars a year, full-time. Remoteroles negotiates transparency into every listing so you are not left guessing about compensation until three interviews in.
Send your resume along with a link to any code samples or projects you are comfortable sharing, even something unrelated to satellites if it shows how you think through a problem. Applications are read by an actual engineer, not filtered purely by keyword matching, and candidates who move forward hear back within roughly a week with next steps.
A short note on why satellite data specifically interests you goes a long way. It does not need to be elaborate, just honest, and reviewers genuinely read it rather than skipping straight to the resume.