Principal Staff Data Center Network Engineer

Principal Data Center Network Engineer

Location: Hybrid | Bellevue, WA Area

Build the Network Foundation for Next-Generation AI Infrastructure

About the Opportunity

A well-funded, rapidly growing AI infrastructure company is building a next-generation cloud platform designed to power the full lifecycle of artificial intelligence. The organization is developing a comprehensive AI infrastructure, platform, and services portfolio that supports the full spectrum of AI workloads, including large-scale compute, model training, fine-tuning, inference, and emerging agentic AI applications.

Backed by significant long-term investment, the company combines the speed, ownership, and innovation of a startup with the stability and resources of an established parent organization. Engineering teams are intentionally lean, highly collaborative, and AI-native, leveraging modern automation and tooling to build world-class infrastructure capable of supporting the industry's most demanding AI workloads.

We're seeking a Principal Data Center Network Engineer to architect and build the networking foundation for a multi-tenant AI cloud platform. This is a greenfield opportunity to define the network architecture supporting GPU clusters, tenant isolation, security, and high-performance connectivity across next-generation AI infrastructure.

The Opportunity

As one of the earliest networking engineers on the infrastructure team, you'll own the design, automation, and evolution of the data center network that powers a rapidly expanding AI platform. You'll work across a multi-vendor networking environment, partnering closely with infrastructure, hardware, platform, and cloud engineering teams to deliver secure, resilient, and high-performance networking at scale.

This is a highly visible Principal-level individual contributor role offering significant technical ownership and influence over the long-term networking strategy of the organization.

What You'll Do

• Design, build, automate, and operate data center networking supporting large-scale GPU clusters, AI workloads, and multi-tenant cloud services.

• Develop secure tenant isolation architectures that ensure performance, scalability, and security across customer environments.

• Design resilient, highly available network architectures across compute, storage, and infrastructure services.

• Work across multiple networking platforms and vendors, including technologies from Arista, Juniper, HPE, and other enterprise networking providers.

• Partner closely with hardware, infrastructure, virtualization, and platform engineering teams to optimize networking for AI training and inference workloads.

• Build infrastructure automation to simplify deployment, configuration management, monitoring, and operational excellence.

• Define networking standards, architecture documentation, and engineering best practices as the infrastructure organization grows.

• Evaluate emerging networking technologies and help shape the long-term evolution of the company's AI networking platform.

What We're Looking For

• Significant experience designing, deploying, and operating large-scale data center networks within hyperscale cloud, AI infrastructure, HPC, or enterprise environments.

• Deep expertise across multiple enterprise networking platforms, with demonstrated experience supporting at least two major vendors such as Arista, Juniper, HPE, Cisco, or equivalent technologies.

• Strong understanding of multi-tenant networking, segmentation, tenant isolation, and network security architecture.

• Experience designing highly available, scalable, and automated networking solutions supporting mission-critical production environments.

• Strong automation mindset with experience implementing Infrastructure as Code, network automation, or programmable networking.

• Ability to operate independently in a fast-paced, early-stage environment where architecture, standards, and processes are being built from the ground up.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting GPU clusters, AI infrastructure, high-performance computing (HPC), or large-scale distributed compute environments.

• Experience with high-bandwidth, low-latency networking technologies such as InfiniBand, RoCE, RDMA, or equivalent fabrics supporting AI workloads.

• Experience building networking platforms for hyperscale cloud providers, AI infrastructure companies, or cloud-native platforms.

• Familiarity with EVPN/VXLAN, Spine-Leaf architectures, BGP, Clos networking, and modern software-defined networking principles.

• Experience with network observability, telemetry, and automation frameworks.

Compensation

• Competitive base pay for Bellevue market

• Certain roles are eligible for additional rewards, including merit increases, annual bonus, and long term incentives. These awards are allocated based on individual performance

• U.S. based employees have access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) plan and company match, employees also receive per calendar year, paid holidays.

Location

• Hybrid role based in the Bellevue, WA area.

• Approximately three days per week in the office.

• Candidates elsewhere in the U.S. who are open to relocation are encouraged to apply.

• U.S. work authorization is required. Visa sponsorship is not currently available.

Why Join?

• Design and build the networking foundation powering one of the industry's most advanced AI infrastructure platforms.

• Own architecture decisions spanning data center networking, tenant isolation, security, and high-performance connectivity.

• Work across cutting-edge GPU infrastructure supporting AI training, inference, and next-generation cloud services.

• Join early enough to establish networking standards, automation, and long-term architectural direction.

• Collaborate with exceptional engineers solving some of the industry's most complex challenges in hyperscale networking and AI infrastructure.

• Enjoy the autonomy and technical ownership of a startup environment backed by substantial long-term investment and a bold vision for the future of AI.