Job Description
Redpanda is pioneering the Agentic Data Plane (ADP) - a new category in AI infrastructure that makes it simple and secure to connect AI agents with enterprise data and systems. Built on a multi-modal data streaming engine, Redpanda empowers agentic applications that reason and act in real-time with speed, autonomy, and precision.
Global leaders including Activision Blizzard, Cisco, Moody’s, Texas Instruments, Vodafone and 2 of the top 5 banks in the U.S. rely on Redpanda to process hundreds of terabytes of data a day.
Backed by premier venture investors Lightspeed, GV and Haystack VC, Redpanda is a diverse, people-first organization with teams distributed around the globe.
About the Role:
We’re looking for an experienced Staff Software Engineer to help architect and build the systems that power Redpanda’s vision for the Agentic Data Plane (ADP), while also shaping the technical culture behind them.
In this role, you will design and develop our ADP product, building on our Bring Your Own Cloud, Serverless, and Redpanda Connect offerings. You will lead system architecture, develop new features, and operate ADP and Redpanda Cloud, helping us meet our 99.99% SLA. You will raise the engineering bar across the Cloud team and collaborate closely with Cloud, Core, and Platform engineering, as well as pre- and post-sales teams, to build robust, scalable systems with a strong emphasis on stability and zero-downtime upgrades.
You Will:
- Design, build and operate ADP and cloud services across AWS, GCP, and Azure, including control plane and data plane components
- Convert ambiguous product requirements into clear technical designs and executable workstreams
- Lead the technical direction of large projects within ADP, and contribute to architecture discussions that span ADP and adjacent Cloud teams
- Anticipate technical risks and proactively mitigate them to ensure timely, high quality delivery
- Set and uphold high standards for reliability, scalability, performance, and security
- Identify and champion new features, process improvements, and strategic initiatives that enhance engineering culture and operational excellence
- Participate in the on-call escalation chain; helping reduce escalations and improve operational health
- Build tools and services for automated infrastructure provisioning, deployment, and self-healing
- Make resilience and observability integral to the systems you own, enabling us to run enterprise-grade agentic systems and service in the cloud
You Have:
- Significant experience designing and operating large-scale, reliable systems in public cloud environments
- A track record of leading large technical projects end-to-end, from design and planning, to execution and production operations
- Strong proficiency in Go (or comparable systems language with willingness to ramp)
- Experience with AI-assisted software development workflows including tools like Claude Code
- Production experience with Kubernetes, including running and operating workloads
- Working knowledge of at least one of AWS / Azure / GCP, including IaC for system and network infrastructure
- Familiarity with stream processing concepts
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills; comfortable working in a globally distributed, async environment (e.g., GitHub)
- Ability to collaborate effectively with engineering, product, and customer-facing stakeholders
Nice to Have:
- Experience building Kubernetes operators for stateful / storage workloads
- Experience building or operating SaaS platforms
- Experience with streaming platforms as a user or provider
- Exposure to production agentic systems and building agentic workflows
Join Redpanda if you’d enjoy being part of a fast-moving, diverse, people-first organization with team members around the globe and a culture based on trust, transparency, communication, and kindness.
