Penumbra brings privacy to proof-of-stake, allowing users to transact, stake, swap, and marketmake without disclosing their personal information, account activity, or trading strategies to the entire world – while still permitting selective disclosure to appropriate parties. Working at Penumbra Labs is a unique opportunity to work on exciting problems and build new financial infrastructure, and offers a collaborative work environment and a meaningful stake in the creation of a new protocol.
What is Penumbra Labs?
Penumbra is a private-by-default proof-of-stake network. Penumbra provides private transactions in any kind of crypto asset, using Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC) to connect to other chains. It also has a novel staking mechanism that provides accountability for validators but privacy for delegators, allowing them to privately stake, earn rewards, and participate in governance. Finally, Penumbra provides a decentralized exchange integrated with its shielded pool. More details on the economic and cryptographic design of Penumbra can be found in the protocol specification on the website.
Role & Responsibilities:
We are looking for a Frontend Engineer to join our team! The right candidate will drive interface development and the evolution of our web capabilities for our ecosystem—all the while documenting learnings and relaying feedback to core protocol developers. Further, the role will work very closely with design to bring new UIs and components to life. This role sits at the intersection of web engineering, UI development, and ecosystem tooling.
Note: most team meetings happen within PST - CET band. If you are located in Europe, please note that meetings could go from 6-8 pm CET approx. twice a week.
Key responsibilities:
- Contribute to the development and evolution of our frontend, extension, and tooling
- Help us on the push to mainnet and after, further develop new web-oriented product features
- Collaborate with designers to bring new user interfaces and components to life
- Document learnings and provide feedback to core protocol developers
- Stay up-to-date with the latest frontend technologies and best practices, and apply them to our projects when appropriate
- Implement bug fixes, codebase improvements, and performance optimizations
You will succeed in this role if:
- You are a great team player but can also work independently
- You are a quick learner and can quickly get up to speed on all the domain-specific knowledge that comes with a privacy chain
- You are willing to take on any task that’s a priority for the team
- You have great communication skills and know how to work well within scrum teams
- You have a love for frontend development and coding UI’s
- You have passion for blockchain/crypto/web3 space
- You love working remotely
Preferred experience:
- We are looking for mid-level to senior experience level so you need at least 4 years of frontend development experience.
- Prior blockchain/web3 experience is strongly preferred.
- Expertise in modern web development technology stack. We use Typescript, React, Zustand, TailwindCSS, TurboRepo, Zod, Radix UI, gRPC, protobufs, & web assembly.
- Proficiency in writing type-safe code in Typescript, writing generics, working within strict-mode, and minimizing the use of any’s.
- Familiarity with testing frameworks like Jest/Vitest & writing high-coverage code.
- Understanding of frontend performance optimization: lazy loading, code splitting, optimizing static assets, using web workers.
- Knowledge of web UI and UX design principles.
- Soft skills: Good communication, problem-solving skills, and a capacity for working with internal and external teams.
- Strong grasp of system design and ability to learn how different layers of the Penumbra and Cosmos stack interact.
Nice-to-haves:
- Experience with Chrome extension development and service workers
- Experience with blockchain systems and understanding of web 3 development patterns
- Familiarity with applied cryptographic technologies
- Experience with Cosmos SDK and/or Tendermint
- Experience with Rust and WebAssembly/wasm-pack
- Experience contributing to open-source projects and communities
Salary & Perks:
The US base salary range for this full-time position is $140,000 - $180,000. Our salary ranges are determined by location, role, and level. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for remote roles. Within the range, individual pay is determined by role, level, and additional factors, including job-related skills and experience. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range during the hiring process.
Aside from a chance to work on an exciting project alongside amazing people, we also offer:
- Unlimited PTO
- Up to 16 weeks of parental leave
- Healthcare
- 401k
- Token & equity options
- Fully remote work mode
Hiring process:
- Initial interview
- Technical skills interview / Live coding
- Take-home assessment
- System design interview
- Culture fit interview
- Onsite interview / Final interview
If you think you have what it takes, but don't necessarily meet every single point on the job description, please still apply. We'd love to have a chance to evaluate your candidacy and see if you could be a great fit.
Penumbra Labs is committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace and is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, protected veteran status, disability, age, religion, or other legally protected status. Penumbra Labs is committed to treating all people in a way that allows them to maintain their dignity and independence. We believe in integration and equal opportunity. Accommodations are available throughout the recruitment process and applicants with a disability may request to be accommodated throughout the recruitment process. We will work with all applicants to accommodate their individual accessibility needs.
