About this role.
Hopper is hiring a Senior Full Stack Engineer to own the real-time voice layer for HTS Assist, an agentic AI assistant for travel support. The role spans React and TypeScript front ends, Scala and Python backend services, GCP infrastructure, telephony integrations, and streaming speech systems. This engineer will build multi-tenant platform capabilities, safety and PII controls, and reliable production operations for revenue-critical deployments. The position requires substantial end-to-end ownership, including architecture, incident response, mentoring, and collaboration with product, design, and operations. Experience with conversational AI, CPaaS providers, and contact-center systems is especially valuable.
Role DNA
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Core skills
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Sample interview questions
I would separate the pipeline into streaming audio ingestion, speech-to-text, orchestration, tool execution, text-to-speech, and audio delivery. I would define latency budgets for each stage, use streaming protocols and partial transcripts where appropriate, instrument end-to-end traces, and provide graceful fallbacks for provider or model failures.
I would use a multi-tenant architecture with tenant-aware configuration, feature flags, policy layers, and integration adapters. Shared domain workflows should remain in the core platform, while partner-specific telephony routing, prompts, branding, and rules are represented as validated configuration or isolated extension points.
I would establish SLIs and SLOs for call completion, latency, transcription quality, error rates, and downstream tool success. I would add structured logs, distributed tracing, actionable alerts, dashboards, runbooks, canary releases, rollback procedures, and regular incident reviews.
I would minimize data collection, classify sensitive fields, redact or tokenize PII before logging and model use where required, and enforce retention and access controls. I would also implement input and output guardrails, policy checks around sensitive actions, audit trails, and human escalation paths for ambiguous or high-risk situations.
I would first make the user impact measurable by defining acceptable latency and quality thresholds for the relevant call flow. Then I would test options such as partial streaming responses, model/provider routing, caching, and fallback voices, using production-like metrics to select the solution that best meets the experience and reliability goals.
About the Role
HTS Assist is Hopper’s agentic AI assistant for travel, resolving flight changes, cancellations, refunds, and bookings over chat and voice for some of the world’s largest travel brands. We’re looking for a senior full stack engineer to anchor this product, owning the realtime and voice layer end to end while building across React/TypeScript front ends, Scala and Python services, and cloud infrastructure. The team is lean and senior, ownership is broad, and the path from your code to a traveler’s phone call is short.
What would your day-to-day look like
Own the voice channel end to end, including telephony and CPaaS integrations (e.g., Twilio, Amazon Connect), streaming speech-to-text and text-to-speech pipelines, realtime model orchestration, and latency and quality budgets
Build product features across the stack, including web chat front ends in React/TypeScript, backend services in Scala and Python, and infrastructure on GCP
Design for multi-tenant scale, with one codebase serving many partners through configuration rather than forks
Build the safety and compliance plumbing enterprise partners audit, including guardrails, content filtering, and PII redaction integration points
Keep revenue-critical deployments healthy through observability, alerting, incident response, and SLA performance
Build the platform capabilities forward-deployed engineers configure for partner telephony integrations and go-lives
Raise the engineering bar through code review, architecture reviews, and mentoring
An ideal candidate has
6+ years of software engineering experience, with senior-level ownership of production systems and genuine full-stack range
Hands-on realtime systems experience, such as voice applications, WebRTC/SIP, streaming media, or comparable low-latency products
Strength in a modern front end (React, TypeScript) and depth on the backend (Scala or another JVM language, and/or Python), along with cloud infrastructure experience on GCP or AWS
A track record designing, building, and maintaining RESTful APIs, microservices, or event-driven systems
Familiarity using AI coding tools as a standard part of their workflow, with the judgment to review, correct, and own everything that ships
An operable-systems mindset, covering SLAs, observability, on-call rotations, and rollback plans
The ability to break down complex problems, make pragmatic tradeoffs, and ship iteratively, backed by strong communication across product, design, and operations
Bonus points for conversational AI or LLM orchestration experience, including speech technologies such as Deepgram, ElevenLabs, Whisper, or OpenAI Realtime
Bonus points for working knowledge of cloud telephony or CPaaS platforms such as Twilio, Amazon Connect, Genesys, or LiveKit
Bonus points for experience building customer service, CRM, contact center, or workflow automation tools
Familiarity with travel industry technologies (PSS/GDS, hotel PMS/CRS) is a plus, though not required
Perks and benefits of working with us
Well-funded and proven startup with large ambitions, competitive salary, upsides of pre-IPO equity packages
Hopper covers 100% of the premiums for the employee for a group insurance plan through Vitality Health
Automatic contributions when you start with Hopper through Smart Pension
Please ask us about our very generous parental leave, much above industry standards
Access to co-working space on demand through FlexDesk and a work-from-home stipend
Carrot Cash travel stipend
Unlimited PTO
Entrepreneurial culture where pushing limits and taking risks is everyday business
Open communication with management and company leadership
Small, dynamic teams, massive impact
About Hopper
At Hopper, we are on a mission to become the leading travel platform globally, powering Hopper’s mobile app, website and our B2B business, HTS (Hopper Technology Solutions). By leveraging massive amounts of data and advanced machine learning algorithms, Hopper combines its world-class travel agency offering with proprietary fintech products to bring transparency, flexibility and savings to travelers globally. We have developed several unique fintech solutions that address everything from pricing volatility to trip disruptions, helping people travel better and save more on their trips.
The Hopper platform serves hundreds of millions of travelers globally and continues to capture market share around the world. The Hopper app has been downloaded over 120 million times and has become largely popular among younger travelers, with 70% of its users being Gen Z and millennials.
While everyone knows us as the Gen Z and Millennial travel app, Hopper has evolved to become much more than that. In recent years, we’ve grown into a travel fintech provider, commerce platform, and global travel agency that powers some of the world’s largest brands.
Through HTS, our B2B division, the company supercharges its partners’ direct channels by integrating our fintech products on their sites or powering end-to-end travel portals. Today, our partners include leading travel brands like Capital One, Nubank, Air Canada, and many more.
Here are just a few stats that demonstrate the company’s recent growth:
Billions of dollars worth of travel and travel fintech are sold through Hopper and HTS’ channels every year.
Our fintech products, including Cancel for Any Reason and Flight Disruption Assistance, have exceptionally strong CSAT because the terms are always clear, and customers receive instant, no-questions-asked resolutions.
Almost 30% of our app customers purchase at least one fintech product when making a booking, and consumers are 1.6x more likely to repurchase if they add fintech to their booking versus if they booked just travel.
Given the success of its fintech products, Hopper launched a B2B initiative, HTS (Hopper Technology Solutions), which represents more than 75% of the business.
Through HTS, any travel provider (airlines, hotels, banks, travel agencies, etc.) can integrate and seamlessly distribute Hopper’s fintech or travel inventory on their direct channels. As its first HTS partnership, the company partnered with Capital One to co-develop Capital One Travel, a new travel portal designed specifically for cardholders. Other HTS partners include Air Canada, Uber, CommBank, Nubank, Flair Airlines and many more.
Hopper has been named the #1 most innovative company in travel by Fast Company. Hopper has been downloaded over 120 million times and continues to have millions of new installs each month. Hopper is now the #3 largest online travel agency in North America and 70% of our app customers are Gen Z and millennial travelers.
Hopper has raised over $750 million USD of private capital and is backed by some of the largest institutional investors and banks in the world. HTS is primed to continue its growth as the leading travel ecommerce provider in a $1 trillion online shopping category. The Hopper app and website will also continue to be the preferred travel provider for Gen Z and Millennials.
Come take off with us!
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