Lead Specialty Software Engineer; Protocol Engineer; Information Technology - Analysts

Job  Concord , California Job Type: Contract Added - a day ago

A client of Innova Solutions is immediately hiring for a Lead Specialty Software Engineer (Protocol Engineer).

Position type:
Full-time, Contract (W2)

Duration: 12 months Contract Possible extension and/or conversion

Location:
Concord, CA – 3 days onsite/ 2 day remote

Overview: Seeking a Lead Specialty Software Engineer (Protocol Engineer) to contribute to a next-generation Digital Asset Platform designed to solve the critical challenge of achieving regulatory compliance without compromising transaction confidentiality. This role focuses on architecting and developing the core settlement engine while working at the intersection of distributed systems, blockchain technology, and applied cryptography. The ideal candidate will translate complex mathematical and cryptographic concepts into high-performance, production-grade Go applications.

As a Lead Specialty Software Engineer (Protocol Engineer), you will:

• Architect and build custom blockchain applications using Go, Cosmos SDK, and CometBFT (Tender mint).
• Design and develop the core settlement engine for a next-generation Digital Asset Platform.
• Implement and optimize privacy-preserving cryptographic primitives including Pedersen Commitments and Bulletproofs (Range Proofs).
• Engineer custom ABCI++ extensions, specifically Prepare Proposal and Vote Extensions, to implement an on-chain Multi-Party Computation (MPC) mixing network.
• Design custom KVStore state machines that manage homomorphic encrypted balances (Elliptic Curve points) instead of plaintext integers.
• Optimize cryptographic operations including scalar multiplication and point addition to improve latency and throughput in distributed environments.
• Build secure off-chain query layers and view key mechanisms to support granular, permissioned regulatory auditing.
• Translate complex cryptographic and mathematical specifications into high-performance, production-grade Go code.
• Work at the intersection of distributed systems and applied cryptography to solve privacy and regulatory compliance challenges.
• Contribute to architectural decisions involving cryptographic curves, libraries, protocol design, and engineering patterns.
• Develop and maintain reliable distributed systems leveraging BFT consensus algorithms, P2P networking, and state replication.
• Build custom blockchain modules and participate in consensus logic enhancements.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to design scalable, secure, and privacy-preserving digital asset infrastructure.
• Apply knowledge of MPC, Verifiable Secret Sharing (VSS), Zero-Knowledge Proofs, and Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) in protocol development.
• Support the design and implementation of privacy-preserving ledger architectures and settlement mechanisms.

The ideal candidate will have:

• Specialty Software Engineering experience or equivalent.
• Backend or systems programming experience with expert-level Go (Golang) proficiency.
• Hands-on experience with Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC).
• Experience with BFT consensus algorithms, P2P networking, and distributed systems. Strong experience with Cosmos SDK and CometBFT/Tender mint.
• Experience building custom blockchain modules and modifying consensus logic. Knowledge of Pedersen Commitments, Bulletproofs, Zero-Knowledge Proofs, and MPC concepts.
• Ability to translate mathematical specifications and academic whitepapers into working code.

This position is only open to applicants who can be engaged on a W-2 basis. 1099 contractors and Corp-to-Corp arrangements will not be considered for this position.

We are currently interviewing to fill this and other similar positions. If this role is not a fit for you, we do offer a referral bonus program for referrals that we…