Job Description
Job DescriptionJob Title: Senior Database DBA – MemSQL / SingleStore Location: New Jersey / Irving, TX / Tampa, FLRole OverviewWe are seeking a Senior MemSQL / SingleStore Cluster Administrator to own and manage mission-critical, large-scale distributed database platforms. This role requires a pure Database Administrator (DBA) with deep expertise in handling petabyte-scale data, complex distributed clusters, and real-time latency-sensitive workloads.Core Technical ExpectationsExperience handling petabytes of data ingested every 15 minutes in large-scale environments.Strong expertise managing large MemSQL / SingleStore clusters (multi-node, multi-TB to multi-PB).Deep understanding of data distribution across aggregators and leaf nodes.Expertise in:
- Partitioning and shard key strategy
- Data skew mitigation
- Hot partition resolution
- Worker node and leaf node optimization
Strong table-level knowledge including:
- Index strategy
- Thread management
- Connection pooling
- Memory limits
- Query plan optimization
Strong understanding of different MemSQL/SingleStore versions and corresponding architectural/feature changes.Key ResponsibilitiesEnd-to-end ownership of large MemSQL/SingleStore clusters (design, build, upgrade, operate, decommission).Architect and maintain High Availability (HA) and Disaster Recovery (DR) setups including:
- Redundancy levels
- Availability groups
- Cross-region replication
Plan and execute:
- Cluster expansion
- Downsizing
- Online partition rebalancing
- Leaf node management with minimal/no downtime
Proactively monitor cluster health, throughput, latency, and capacity; define and maintain SLAs.Perform advanced performance tuning:
- Schema design
- Shard key design
- Index strategy
- NUMA and memory tuning
- Workload management
Implement backup/restore strategies and regularly test DR & failover.Lead incident response and perform deep root cause analysis.Enforce database security best practices:
- Authentication & authorization
- Encryption
- Auditing
- Network controls
Drive automation using scripting (Python/Bash) and Infrastructure as Code.Maintain documentation, operational runbooks, and standards.Evaluate new MemSQL/SingleStore features and lead version upgrades and migrations.Required Experience & Skills10+ years of total database engineering/administration experience.4–5+ years of deep, production-grade experience administering MemSQL/SingleStore clusters at scale.Strong hands-on experience with:
- Aggregators & leaf nodes
- Licensing and memory limits
- Cluster expansion & partition rebalancing
- Replication & failover/failback
- Proven ability to diagnose:
- Locking issues
- Data skew
- Hot partitions
- Bad execution plans
- Strong Linux system tuning knowledge:
- CPU/NUMA affinity
- Disk & I/O optimization
- Networking
- ulimits & OS-level tuning
- Experience with monitoring & alerting tools:
- Prometheus / Grafana
- Datadog
- Splunk
- ELK
- Strong SQL expertise and scripting (Python/Bash).
- Experience in Cloud/Container environments (AWS/Azure/GCP, Kubernetes) is highly preferred.
Excellent communication skills with ability to lead production calls and explain technical trade-offs clearly.