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. #J-18808-Ljbffr Jobleads-US