Docker, Inc · 3 days ago
Principal Software Engineer, AI Developer Tools
United States
Full-time
Remote
Lead/Staff
$232K/yr - $319K/yr
10+ years expDocker is a company focused on making app development easier for developers. They are seeking a Principal Engineer to define the technical vision and architecture for their new AI Developer Tools team, which involves architecting innovative AI-powered tools and building a self-service platform for rapid development and deployment.
Developer PlatformDeveloper ToolsInformation TechnologySoftware
No H1B
Responsibilities
Define the long-term technical vision and architecture for AI-powered developer tools and the self-service platform that enables teams to build their own AI agents
Establish architectural patterns, technical standards, and best practices for LLM integration, AI agent development, and production AI systems serving developers
Lead technical strategy for platform capabilities including deployment frameworks (ArgoCD/GitOps), observability integration (Grafana), security controls, and operational tooling for AI developer tools
Design highly available, scalable infrastructure for hosting AI agents and developer tools with predictable performance and intelligent resource management
Drive technical decisions on AI technology choices, LLM provider strategies, prompt engineering approaches, and agent orchestration frameworks
Partner with Senior Manager and product leadership to align technical architecture with business objectives and productization opportunities
Architect and build production-ready AI agents for developer productivity including code review assistants, test generators, deployment diagnostics, and incident response automation
Design and implement the self-service platform infrastructure that reduces time-to-production for new AI tools from weeks to days
Build systems that accelerate adoption of AI-native development tools (Claude Code, Cursor, Warp) across Docker's engineering organization
Establish reliability, security, and performance standards for AI systems including SLOs, monitoring, incident response, and cost management
Design integration points between AI developer tools and existing developer infrastructure (CI/CD pipelines, observability platforms, deployment systems)
Lead technical implementation of AI tools that improve early-stage development metrics (commits, PRs), deployment pipelines, and incident response while maintaining pipeline stability
Evaluate emerging AI/LLM technologies, developer tooling trends, and agent frameworks to inform Docker's technical strategy
Define technical approach for productizing internal AI developer tools into customer-facing offerings
Drive technical standards for measuring AI tool effectiveness including adoption metrics, productivity gains, and developer satisfaction
Optimize AI tool performance, cost efficiency, and developer experience through architectural improvements and LLM provider strategies
Lead cross-functional technical discussions influencing company-wide AI and developer tooling architecture
Mentor senior and staff engineers on AI/LLM integration patterns, agent development, and platform engineering best practices
Lead design reviews and technical decision-making for production AI systems
Foster culture of technical excellence, experimentation, and rapid prototyping within AI Developer Tools team
Serve as primary technical contact and thought leader for AI in developer workflows across Docker's engineering organization
Collaborate with platform teams (Infrastructure, Security, Data) to establish shared technical standards and integration patterns
Qualification
Required
10+ years software engineering experience with 3+ years in Staff or Principal Engineer roles
Deep expertise in AI/ML technologies with hands-on production experience building LLM-powered applications, AI agents, or AI-assisted developer tools
Strong understanding of LLM APIs (OpenAI, Anthropic, etc.), prompt engineering, agent orchestration frameworks, and practical applications of AI in software development workflows
Proven track record of architecting and building highly scalable distributed systems and developer-facing platforms
Production experience with modern cloud-native infrastructure including Kubernetes, GitOps deployment patterns, observability systems, and CI/CD pipelines
Proficiency in Go (preferred), Rust, Java, or Python with strong software engineering fundamentals
Experience designing developer tools, platform engineering systems, or internal tools that enable other teams
Exceptional product and platform mindset considering business outcomes, developer experience, and technical trade-offs
Strong communication skills with ability to influence technical and non-technical stakeholders across the organization
Track record of technical mentorship and elevating engineering teams' capabilities
Ownership mentality with bias for action and iterative delivery in ambiguous, fast-moving environments
Comfortable with autonomous work in distributed, remote-first teams across multiple time zones
Preferred
Experience with MCP (Model Context Protocol) or similar AI agent integration standards
Background in developer productivity, DevOps, SRE, or platform engineering domains
Contributions to open source AI tools, developer tooling, or platform engineering projects
Experience productizing internal platforms or tools into commercial offerings
Deep knowledge of security, compliance, and operational best practices for production AI systems
Experience with infrastructure-as-code frameworks (Terraform, Pulumi) and multi-cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure)
Benefits
Freedom & flexibility; fit your work around your life
Designated quarterly Whaleness Days plus end of year Whaleness break
Home office setup; we want you comfortable while you work
16 weeks of paid Parental leave
Technology stipend equivalent to $100 net/month
PTO plan that encourages you to take time to do the things you enjoy
Training stipend for conferences, courses and classes
Equity; we are a growing start-up and want all employees to have a share in the success of the company
Docker Swag
Medical benefits, retirement and holidays vary by country
Remote-first culture, with offices in Seattle and Paris
Company
Docker, Inc
At Docker, we simplify the lives of developers who are making world-changing apps.
501-1000 employees
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
$435.86MKey Investors
Bain Capital VenturesTribe CapitalInsight Partners
2022-03-31Series C· $105M
2021-03-16Series B· $23M
2019-11-13Series A· $35M
Leadership Team
Jean-Laurent de Morlhon
Vice President of Software Engineering
K
Kamel Founadi
Founder
Recent News
2026-01-06
The Hacker News
2025-12-30
Company data provided by crunchbase