Network Automation Software Lead

TensorWave

$135K — $160K *
Information Technology
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 8+ years of relevant experience
  • Proven experience building network automation at scale, ideally in a hyperscaler or large datacenter
  • Experience in end-to-end ZTP/device-provisioning systems
  • Strong software engineering fundamentals in Python and/or Go
  • Hands-on experience with datacenter Clos fabrics and network protocols
  • Fluency in modern network automation technologies like gNMI/openConfig and YANG
  • Experience with observability and telemetry pipelines
  • Comfortable running services on Kubernetes/containers
  • Leadership experience in team or platform ownership

Responsibilities

  • Own the end-to-end zero-touch provisioning pipeline
  • Build intent-based config generation with GitOps-style deployments
  • Establish network validation and pre-deployment testing
  • Build telemetry and metrics/logging pipelines for fabric health
  • Instrument key metrics for GPU networks and deliver actionable dashboards
  • Gather requirements and build self-service APIs to accelerate deployment
  • Hire and mentor a team of engineers and SREs while contributing hands-on
  • Set technical direction and ensure clean integration with platform stack
  • Apply software engineering rigor to network automation processes

Benefits

  • Stock Options
  • 100% paid Medical, Dental, and Vision insurance for Employees
  • Company Health Savings Account Contributions
  • 100% paid Short and Long Term Disability Insurance for Employees
  • Life and Voluntary Supplemental Insurance Options
  • Various Supplementary Health Benefits including discounted Virtual Healthcare
  • Flexible Spending Account
  • 401(k)
  • Employee Assistance Program
  • Flexible PTO
  • Paid Holidays
  • Parental Leave
  • Other In-Office Perks
Full Job Description
About the Role

We're hiring a Network Automation Software Lead to build and own the end-to-end zero-touch provisioning (ZTP) and automation platform that stands up and operates our GPU network fabrics and to lead the small team of engineers and SREs building it.

The goal is zero human intervention and full fabric validation: a switch goes from rack-and-stack to production-ready automatically, ensuring every link across the fabric is validated against the plan and spec. Our Network Engineering team is your customer; you build the platform, they run the network on top of it.

You'll report to a Software Engineering Lead, which means this is real software engineering, not scripts bolted onto a NOC. Source control, testing, CI/CD, code review, release management, and on-call are the baseline. You'll also be responsible for making sure the platform integrates cleanly with the rest of our software and platform tooling.

What You'll Do
  • Own the end-to-end ZTP pipeline: bare-metal switch boot → image + base config → registration in source of truth → full intended config → validation → production - with zero human intervention.
  • Build intent-based config generation off a network source of truth / IPAM, with GitOps-style deployment, pre/post-change validation, and safe rollout and rollback.
  • Establish network validation and pre-deployment testing (snapshot/digital-twin testing) so changes are caught before they hit production fabrics.
  • Build streaming telemetry and metrics/logging pipelines (gNMI / OpenConfig) for fabric health.
  • Instrument what matters for GPU networks: RoCE health (PFC/ECN counters), optics and link errors, BGP / EVPN state, capacity and utilization.
  • Deliver dashboards and alerting the network team actually uses - signal, not noise.
  • Gather requirements, build self-service APIs and interfaces, and relentlessly accelerate their deployment velocity.
  • Partner closely so the tooling reflects how the network is actually operated and turned up.
  • Hire, mentor, and grow a small team of software engineers and SREs; own roadmap, prioritization, and delivery - while still carrying a meaningful share of the code yourself.
  • Set technical direction and standards, and ensure clean integration points with the broader platform stack (infra provisioning, CI/CD, secrets, identity, existing observability).
  • Bring software engineering rigor to network automation: code review, testing, release management, and on-call ownership.


Who You Are

Required Qualifications
  • 8+ years of relevant experience
  • Proven experience building network automation at scale - ideally at a hyperscaler, large cloud, or large-scale datacenter / AI-infrastructure operator.
  • You've built or been a core contributor to a ZTP / device-provisioning system end-to-end, not just maintained one.
  • Strong software engineering fundamentals: Python and/or Go, with real production practices (version control, testing, CI/CD, code review).
  • Hands-on depth with datacenter Clos fabrics and the protocols that run them: BGP, EVPN/VXLAN, and ideally RoCEv2 / RDMA for GPU networks at scale.
  • Fluency with modern network automation tech: gNMI/gNOI, OpenConfig/YANG, NETCONF; source-of-truth systems (NetBox / Nautobot); NOS platforms (SONiC/FRR or vendor equivalents); tooling like Nornir / NAPALM / Ansible.
  • Experience with observability / telemetry pipelines (Prometheus, Grafana, Kafka, OpenTelemetry, or similar).
  • Comfort running services on Kubernetes / containers.
  • Leadership: you've led a team or been the clear technical owner of a platform, and you instinctively treat internal users as customers.

Preferred Qualifications
  • Experience with GPU / AI training or inference clusters and their backend networks.
  • Familiarity with the AMD networking ecosystem (Pensando DPUs, Ultra Ethernet) or building on Ethernet-based RDMA fabrics.
  • Whitebox / disaggregated networking and SONiC at scale.
  • Network validation / digital-twin tooling (e.g., Batfish, containerlab).
  • Multi-site / multi-region datacenter buildouts.


What We Offer
  • Stock Options
  • 100% paid Medical, Dental, and Vision insurance for Employees
  • Company Health Savings Account Contributions
  • 100% paid Short Term and Long Term Disability Insurance for Employees
  • Life and Voluntary Supplemental Insurance Options
  • Other Insurance Options, such as Pet & Legal Insurance
  • Various Supplementary Health Benefits, such as discounted Virtual Healthcare Appointments and Serious Illness Support
  • Flexible Spending Account
  • 401(k)
  • Employee Assistance Program
  • Flexible PTO
  • Paid Holidays
  • Parental Leave
  • Other In-Office Perks


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