Senior Software Engineer, Control Plane

About the role

Starburst is looking for strong Java engineers to work with our globally distributed engineering team on the core of Starburst's software. This role sits on the Control Plane team, whose mandate is to converge the control planes of our two flagship deployment models, self-managed Starburst Enterprise Platform (SEP) and fully managed Starburst Galaxy, into a single, unified platform.

You will design and build backend services and cloud infrastructure that run in both worlds: multi-tenant SaaS at global scale, and customer-operated on-premise and air-gapped deployments. Both models bring unique and interesting problems, and incredible learning opportunities for any engineer. Starburst offers the opportunity to compete at global scale with other elite vendors in the Data Analytics space and external customers.

As a Senior Software Engineer, Control Plane at Starburst you will:

• Design, develop, and maintain control plane services shared by Starburst Enterprise, Starburst Galaxy, and Trino.
• Contribute to the Unified Control Plane: take capabilities that exist in one product (access control, multi-cluster management, routing, catalog management, observability) and deliver them as a single implementation that serves both SaaS and self-managed deployments.
• Own the reliability, scalability, and efficiency (performance/$) of the services you build - provisioning and upgrading APIs, cluster lifecycle management, and the operational tooling that runs them.
• Build for two very different operating models at once: a service Starburst operates at scale, and software our customers deploy and operate themselves across AWS, Azure, and GCP as well as on-premise.
• Provide considerate and timely review of your peers' pull requests and design proposals.
• Continuously improve our engineering processes, tests, and systems so the codebase and the team's productivity scale together.
• Collaborate with team members and other teams globally, and operate in a fast-paced environment.
• We prioritize focused work, ensuring minimal time is spent in formal meetings, allowing you to concentrate on coding and PR reviews.
• Clearly articulating your ideas in writing — Slack, GitHub PRs, design documents — is essential in our globally distributed team.
• Provide exceptional customer support for both internal and external customers.
• We're humbled by the trust our customers place in our platform to crunch their data, and we handle the problems they report with utmost seriousness.
• Periodically assist with the React and TypeScript-based Portal UI that surfaces these features; while knowledge of frontend development is beneficial, it is not a prerequisite.

Some of the things we look for:

• Prior experience developing distributed systems.
• Extensive software development experience with Java.
• Cloud infrastructure architecture and orchestration experience across at least one major cloud provider.
• Experience building and operating backend services that others depend on — APIs, control loops, lifecycle management.
• Hands-on adoption of AI coding tools and agents in day-to-day engineering — shipping real code with them, and sound judgment about where they help and where they don't.
• Demonstrated experience with software engineering and design best practices.
• Appreciation for creating maintainable, performant, and high-quality software as part of a high-performing, globally distributed team.
• Intrinsic motivation for improving your software engineering craftsmanship.
• Comfort with significant autonomy and ownership.
• Curiosity to see what other engineering teams are doing, and the ability to connect the dots — essential when the goal is one implementation replacing two.
• Demonstration of Ownership, Grit, and Bias for Action — core values at Starburst.
• Ability to Travel: This role will require 25% in-person travel for purposes including but not limited to new hire onboarding, team and department offsites, customer engagements, and other company events. Actual travel expectations may vary by role and business needs.

Where could this role be based?

• Boston, MA / Remote US