Software Engineer (Backend)

ROLE OVERVIEW

The ASEAN AI Innovation Centre is the overseas R&D hub of our AI Business Group, localizing mature AI products from China and building new AI products for Malaysia and broader ASEAN markets, with a focus on energy and education.

We are hiring Backend Engineers to build the products our customers actually use. You will work within the architecture and conventions defined by our two Senior Software Engineers (platform and integration tracks), turning product requirements into reliable APIs, business logic, and data services for AI+Energy and AI+Education products.

A distinctive part of this role is owning customer data access: our energy products live on data from customer-side systems such as SCADA, EMS, and inverter monitoring platforms, and you will build and maintain the pipelines and connectors that bring this data in reliably.

This is an AI-first engineering team: we use AI coding tools (Claude Code, Cursor, and similar) daily, and part of your job is supervising and reviewing the output of AI coding agents — not just writing every line yourself. You should be comfortable making AI tools part of how you work, and curious about how this changes software engineering. This is a hands-on individual-contributor role — you build and ship the code yourself.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Product Feature Development: Implement backend product features end to end within the team’s architecture, coding standards, and review gates. Write code that is modular, tested, and AI-friendly.

• APIs & Business Logic: Design and build APIs, business logic, and service integrations for AI agent products, intelligent reporting, and workflow tools.

• Customer Data Access: Build pipelines and connectors for SCADA, EMS, inverter monitoring, and enterprise systems, with validation and monitoring. Support the delivery team on data issues found at customer sites.

• AI-Assisted Development: Use AI coding tools daily. Drive and review AI coding agents’ output against team standards; flag and fix quality issues before they ship.

• Quality & Maintainability: Write unit and integration tests, participate in code reviews, and keep the codebase healthy as multiple humans and AI agents work in it concurrently.

• Cross-Team Collaboration: Work with the Product Manager on requirements, the delivery team on field issues, and China headquarters teams on source product logic.

WHAT YOU MUST BRING

• 3+ years of hands-on backend engineering experience shipping real products.

• Proficiency in at least one of Go, Python, TypeScript, or Java; solid database and REST API skills.

• Experience integrating third-party or industrial systems (SCADA, IoT platforms, enterprise APIs) is a plus.

• Practical use of AI coding assistants (Cursor, Copilot, Claude Code, or similar) in your own workflow, or strong willingness to adopt them as your daily driver.

• Good testing habits and a code-review mindset — quality matters more when AI generates part of the code.

• Clear communication skills in English.

WHAT YOU CAN LEARN HERE

• AI-native development workflows: multi-agent coding practices, context engineering, and review gates for AI-generated code.

• How energy and education products work: solar O&M, power forecasting, energy management, and AI agent products in real enterprise environments.

• A clear growth path toward senior engineering under two experienced architecture-track mentors.

LANGUAGE

Proficiency in English is essential. Proficiency in (Mandarin) is strongly preferred. Malay is a plus for on-site work and local coordination.

"We are looking for Mandarin-speaking candidates who will be serving Mandarin-speaking customers."

WHY JOIN US

• Founding team opportunity: join a brand-new AI R&D centre in its first year and shape how it builds software.

• AI-first team culture: every team member uses AI tools daily; you will work alongside AI coding agents, not just other engineers.

• Work with frontier AI models on real industry problems in energy and education across Southeast Asia.

• 3-year strategic incubation: no short-term revenue pressure. Focus on building the right products and the right skills.

TEAM CONTEXT

In Year 1 the Centre is a compact full-time team of 15. You will report to the two Senior Software Engineers (platform and integration tracks) and work daily with the AI-Native Product Manager, the Product UI Engineer, the delivery team, and AI coding agents. Engineering interns will work alongside you on evaluation and internal tooling.