At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead the architecture and performance of cutting-edge storage solutions at NetApp.
- Company: Join a pioneering tech company transforming data infrastructure.
- Benefits: Competitive salary, comprehensive benefits, and hybrid work environment.
- Other info: Collaborative culture that celebrates innovation and personal growth.
- Why this job: Make a real impact on AI data lakes and large-scale storage systems.
- Qualifications: 12+ years in systems engineering with strong programming skills.
At NetApp, your ideas power innovation. We lead in intelligent data infrastructure - delivering unified storage, integrated data services, and solutions that help organizations unlock the full potential of their data, from AI to multicloud.
Ready to innovate and contribute to our path to $10B? Here, you'll collaborate with passionate teams, tackle real-world challenges, and see your impact in how customers transform and grow. If you're ready to bring curiosity, creativity, and drive to every moment, NetApp is where your journey begins.
NetApp is pioneering object storage - S3-compatible, software-defined storage that powers the exponential growth of AI data lakes, analytics, and exabyte-scale enterprise data. As a Principal Engineer for Datapath / Performance, you will own the architecture and technical direction of the StorageGRID S3 data path and its end-to-end performance. This role is ideal for a deeply hands-on technical leader who thrives at the intersection of distributed systems, storage internals, and high-scale performance engineering.
As a Principal Engineer on the StorageGRID team, you will be the technical authority for the S3 data path including metadata and performance. You will define the architectural north star for how StorageGRID moves and serves data and resolve the hardest performance and scaling problems affecting AI data lakes.
At the Principal level, the role requires exceptional hands-on technical depth, sound architectural judgment, and the ability to influence direction across engineering, QA, product management, and field teams.
Job Responsibilities
- Own the architecture and technical implementation of the StorageGRID S3 data path - from ingest/retrieve/delete to metadata storage to the on-disk replicated/erasure-coded data flow.
- Lead performance analysis, benchmarking then identify performance improvements and deliver.
- Design for scale and geo-distribution - multi-site, cross-grid replication, and global/federated namespace behavior at hundreds of nodes and exabyte scale.
- Drive large, cross-cutting data path initiatives from architecture through implementation, validation, and release readiness.
- Stay deep in the code and the hardest bugs; set the technical bar through high-quality design, reviews, root-cause analysis, and pragmatic engineering standards.
- Lead StorageGRID designs and drive architectural alignment across data path engineering.
Job Requirements
- 12+ years of experience in systems, storage, distributed systems, or performance engineering, with a track record of technical leadership.
- Strong hands-on programming skills in one or more of C/C++, Go, or Python, and experience debugging distributed software in Linux-based environments.
- Built or owned an object storage system, S3 implementation, or large-scale distributed storage/database product including request data path, data placement, replication/erasure coding, consistency, and failure handling.
- Experience with Apache Cassandra or comparable distributed databases at scale.
- Proven ability to influence technical direction across teams without direct authority.
- Mentor Senior and MTS engineers on data path internals, performance optimization, distributed-systems design, and debugging practices.
- Collaborate with quality engineering, product management, supportability, support, and field teams to translate customer requirements into data path and performance improvements.
Nice To Have Qualifications
- Experience with S3 protocol semantics (multipart, versioning, Object Lock/WORM) and the data path implications of the API contract.
- Experience with load balancing, network, storage media (NVMe/SSD/HDD), and x86 hardware.
- Experience with AI-assisted development and observability tooling for analysis, debugging, testing, and documentation.
At NetApp, we embrace a hybrid working environment designed to strengthen connection, collaboration, and culture for all employees. This means that most roles will have some level of in-office and/or in-person expectations, which will be shared during the recruitment process.
NetApp is firmly committed to Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) and to compliance with all federal, state and local laws that prohibit employment discrimination based on age, race, color, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, religion, disability or genetic information, pregnancy, protected veteran status, and any other protected classification.
Principal Engineer, Data Path / Metadata / Performance in Vancouver employer: NetApp
At NetApp, we empower our employees to innovate and excel in a collaborative environment that values creativity and initiative. As a leader in intelligent data infrastructure, we offer competitive compensation, comprehensive benefits, and opportunities for professional growth, all while fostering a culture that celebrates diversity and encourages bold thinking. Join us in North America, where your contributions will directly impact our mission to transform data into opportunity and drive meaningful change across industries.
