Senior Backend Engineer, Managed Kubernetes & Slurm

Stack

Responsibilities

• ▹Design, build, and operate backend services in Go or Python for Lightning AI's managed infrastructure platform
• ▹Develop control plane services that provision, orchestrate, and manage Kubernetes and Slurm clusters
• ▹Build distributed systems automating cluster lifecycle management, workload scheduling, and infrastructure provisioning
• ▹Develop platform capabilities using Kubernetes APIs, controllers, and operators
• ▹Improve reliability, scalability, security, and observability of the managed platform through automation
• ▹Diagnose and resolve complex production issues across Kubernetes, distributed systems, and networking
• ▹Collaborate with infrastructure, AI, and platform engineering teams
• ▹Contribute to technical design, architecture, mentoring, and on-call operations

Requirements

• ▹Significant professional experience designing, building, and operating production backend systems in Go or Python
• ▹Deep hands-on experience with Kubernetes or Slurm, including large-scale production environments
• ▹Strong understanding of distributed systems and cloud-native architectures
• ▹Experience designing scalable backend services, APIs, and automation for infrastructure or platform operations
• ▹Strong understanding of networking, storage, and cloud infrastructure fundamentals
• ▹Familiarity with observability, CI/CD, testing, and incident response
• ▹Ability to own complex technical projects while collaborating across engineering teams

Nice to have

• ▹Kubernetes platform development experience (operators, controllers, CRDs, control plane components)
• ▹Slurm administration, scheduling, or HPC environment experience
• ▹Infrastructure-as-Code or GitOps tooling (Terraform, Crossplane, Helm, Argo CD, Flux, Kustomize)
• ▹GPU infrastructure, AI platforms, or large-scale compute environments
• ▹Kubernetes networking, storage, or multi-tenant platform architecture
• ▹Event-driven systems, gRPC, or distributed messaging
• ▹Building CI/CD systems for production environments
• ▹Contributions to cloud-native or open source infrastructure projects

Soft skills

What we offer

• ▹Comprehensive health coverage (medical, dental, vision)
• ▹Meaningful equity (RSUs)
• ▹401(k) matching (US) / pension contributions (UK)
• ▹Unlimited PTO, company and floating holidays
• ▹Two-week company-wide winter break
• ▹Paid parental and family leave
• ▹Annual learning and development allowance
• ▹Wellness and work-from-home stipends
• ▹Four weeks of paid sabbatical after four years of service
• ▹Flexible schedules and hybrid work model
• ▹Complimentary meals at office hubs

About the company

Lightning AI is the company behind PyTorch Lightning, building an end-to-end platform for developing, training, and deploying AI systems. Following its merger with Voltage Park, it combines developer-first tooling with cost-efficient, large-scale compute, running an AI-native cloud powered by 25,000+ H100, B200, and GB300 GPUs.