Maya Chen

Staff engineer on multiplayer at Figma

Maya builds the quiet systems behind tools people share. Ten years from routing on Google Maps, through billing at Stripe, to the presence layer that makes a Figma file feel like one room.

Location

San Francisco

Status

—

Records

8

Drawn

2026-09-01

ACareer schematic

DDetails

1. Detail 01 · Education2011-2015

   B.S. Computer Science

   Carnegie Mellon University · Pittsburgh

   School of Computer Science. Coursework in distributed systems, algorithms, and human-computer interaction, with a senior project on shared cursors.

   1. N1Teaching assistant for 15-213, Introduction to Computer Systems
   2. N2Senior thesis on presence in shared documents
   Distributed systems / C / HCISchool of Computer Science →
2. Detail 02 · Course2014-2014

   Machine Learning

   Coursera · Remote

   Andrew Ng’s Machine Learning course, taken the summer before senior year and applied to a ranking prototype in the fall.

   1. N1Completed the original Stanford Machine Learning course on Coursera
   Machine learningMachine Learning specialization →
3. Detail 03 · Work2015-2018

   Software Engineer

   Google · Mountain View

   Software engineer on Google Maps. Worked on route ranking and the freshness of traffic tiles served to the map.

   1. N1Shipped a reranking pass that preferred routes with live traffic over static estimates
   2. N2Cut stale traffic-tile reads on the commute corridors the team owned
   Java / Maps / Distributed systemsGoogle Maps →
4. Detail 04 · Work2018-2022

   Senior Software Engineer

   Stripe · South San Francisco

   Senior engineer on Stripe Billing. Owned invoice calculation and the tax hook that became Stripe Tax.

   1. N1Led the invoice engine used by Stripe Billing subscriptions
   2. N2Shipped the tax calculation path behind Stripe Tax at general availability in 2021
   Billing / Ruby / API designStripe Billing →Stripe Tax →
5. Detail 05 · Achievement2021-2021

   Stripe Tax, general availability

   Stripe · South San Francisco

   Stripe Tax reached general availability in 2021. Maya owned the calculation service merchants call when an invoice is finalized.

   1. N1Named on the internal launch for the Billing integration
   Tax / BillingStripe Tax →
6. Detail 06 · Work2022-Now · Active

   Staff Software Engineer

   Figma · San Francisco

   Staff engineer on multiplayer. Presence, cursors, and the follow mode that keeps a FigJam board in sync for a room full of people.

   1. N1Owns the presence service behind live cursors in Figma and FigJam
   2. N2Shipped follow mode so a facilitator can pull a board to one viewport
   Multiplayer / TypeScript / CRDTsFigJam →
7. Detail 07 · Achievement2024-2024

   Config talk on presence

   Figma · San Francisco

   Spoke at Config, Figma’s design conference, on how follow mode stays smooth when fifty cursors share one file.

   1. N1Config is Figma’s annual conference
   SpeakingConfig →

EBuilt work