Staff Engineer, Network Infrastructure

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in Colorado.

📋 Description

• Design and develop network automation and orchestration systems for DigitalOcean's worldwide network infrastructure.

• Create software for network provisioning, configuration management, device lifecycle management, validation, monitoring, and automated remediation.

• Develop software that integrates with DPUs, SmartNICs, and programmable network infrastructure.

• Automate large-scale datacenter and Point of Presence deployments, new hardware, network fabrics, routing infrastructure, and vendor integrations.

• Create abstractions across various network vendors and hardware implementations while ensuring operational safety and reliability.

• Develop diagnostic tools and automate operational workflows.

• Transform manual, repetitive, or error-prone infrastructure operations into scalable software solutions.

• Collaborate with network engineers and infrastructure architects on maintainable software architectures.

• Set engineering standards for infrastructure software development, testing, observability, and operational readiness.

• Oversee projects from technical design through implementation, deployment, and long-term operation.

• Define technical direction and make architectural decisions for network and infrastructure software.

• Write RFCs, architecture and design documents, technical proposals, project plans, and other relevant documentation.

• Lead complex, high-impact initiatives across various teams and infrastructure layers.

• Assess emerging hardware and software technologies for DigitalOcean's infrastructure.

• Actively utilize AI tools to enhance development, debugging, testing, documentation, and technical exploration while upholding production-quality standards.

• Mentor engineers and provide technical leadership throughout the organization.

• Foster partnerships across Network Infrastructure, Compute, Storage, Availability, Security, and Hardware/Platform Engineering.

⛳️ Requirements

• Extensive experience in designing and building production software systems at scale.

• Strong foundation in software engineering principles, including distributed systems, API design, concurrency, testing, observability, and system reliability.

• Proficient in one or more programming languages such as Go, Python, or C++.

• Experience in building automation, orchestration, or infrastructure platforms.

• In-depth understanding of networking concepts, including TCP/IP, BGP, EVPN/VXLAN, VLANs, routing, switching, and network telemetry.

• Familiarity with network devices, network automation frameworks, APIs, or vendor SDKs.

• Experience designing systems that operate safely in highly available, production environments.

• Ability to simplify complex infrastructure challenges into scalable software architectures.

• Excellent technical writing skills with the ability to generate RFCs, architecture/design documents, technical proposals, project plans, and related documentation.

• Capability to transform ambiguous problems into technical proposals, documented requirements, architectural decisions, and actionable implementation plans.

• Strong communication skills and the ability to influence technical decisions across engineering teams.

• Proven ability to act as a technical leader without relying on organizational authority.

• Experience with DPUs, SmartNICs, IPUs, programmable data planes, eBPF, P4, or hardware-accelerated networking is advantageous.

• Familiarity with hyperscale or cloud infrastructure, SONiC, white-box networking, 400G+ datacenter networks, OpenConfig, gNMI, NETCONF, YANG, streaming telemetry, Kubernetes, cloud-native infrastructure, or open-source infrastructure projects is a plus.

🏝️ Benefits

• Reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and educational opportunities.

• Access to LinkedIn Learning's vast library of over 10,000 courses.

• Employee Assistance Program.

• Opportunities for local employee meetups.

• Flexible time-off policy.

• Bonus eligibility based on both company and individual performance.

• Equity grants upon hire for eligible employees.

• Employee Stock Purchase Program for qualifying employees.