Staff Software Engineer, AI Platform (San Francisco)

Redpanda is the first runtime and control plane for agent-data interaction — a unified platform that combines streaming, SQL analytics, and intelligent connectivity with the governance layer enterprise AI agents need in production.

Built on infrastructure already trusted by Fortune 500 companies and fast-growing startups, Redpanda enforces governance entirely outside the agent's data path, controlling what agents see, limiting what they do, and capturing a tamper-proof record of everything they touch, so organizations never have to choose between innovation and control.

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.

This is a hybrid role based in our San Francisco office.

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

U.S. base salary range for this role is $220,000 - $260,000.Our salary ranges are determined by role, level, and location. We strive to consider each candidate's job-related skills, location, experience, relevant education or training to determine individual base salary. Your talent partner will share more about the specific salary range for your preferred location during the hiring process.

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. You'll dive into a nimble, high-impact team with the latest AI tools — and the budget to actually use them.