← All roles

Principal Software Engineer (Platform Team)

SpaceX· Starship Software Engineering
Apply on company site
Redmond, WA$200k - $285kfull-timePosted 5mo ago

About the role

Principal Software Engineer for SpaceX's AI platform. Leads technical vision and architecture for AI platform and security infrastructure, architecting scalable, trustworthy AI capabilities across SpaceX by building secure gateways, proxies, and tooling to enable widespread AI use.

Responsibilities

  • Define and drive the long-term technical vision and architecture for SpaceX’s AI platform and security infrastructure
  • Lead high-impact initiatives with full ownership over strategy, design, implementation, and successful company-wide rollout
  • Oversee onboarding of frontier models, massive compute scaling, and continuous optimization of proxy systems for security, efficiency, logging, and control
  • Lead adoption efforts at scale — establishing standards, mentoring senior engineers, building reusable assets, and driving cultural change toward AI-first workflows
  • Proactively identify and execute on the highest-leverage opportunities to turn ideas into production software, trained models, and automated systems with managed, reliable compute
  • Invent and scale advanced risk-mitigation capabilities (AI code review, automated PR tools, safety systems) that protect and accelerate the business
  • Establish best practices and technical direction for lean, secure, and maximally effective applied AI across the company
  • Serve as a key technical advisor and collaborator with leadership and cross-functional teams to align platform capabilities with SpaceX’s most ambitious goals

Qualifications

  • Bachelor’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, or other engineering discipline and 7+ years of professional experience building and scaling production platforms; OR 9+ years of professional experience building and scaling production platforms in lieu of a degree
  • Experience designing and operating large-scale AI/ML platforms, internal developer platforms, or mission-critical infrastructure

Skills

Required:Technical leadershipDocker/KubernetesSecurity and zero-trust architecturesMLOps / AI platform managementPython
Nice to have:Infrastructure as code

Benefits

  • comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage
  • access to a 401(k) retirement plan
  • short and long-term disability insurance
  • life insurance
  • paid parental leave
  • various other discounts and perks
  • 3 weeks of paid vacation and 10+ paid holidays per year
  • paid sick leave according to company policy
Last updated Jul 8, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.

About SpaceX

defense-aero-and-safetysetter-30setter-30-2026-q1wing-list-2026wing-list-2026-giga-stage
Company profileWebsite

More open roles at SpaceX