Senior Software Engineer, Software Defined Networking

Verda; Helsinki; Hybrid; EUR 90,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

Verda in Helsinki is building a full-stack AI cloud and is looking for a Senior engineer to turn the networking layer into a product.

You will design and implement networking features end to end, from packet path to API, extend the dataplane near hardware, and own the Go-based control plane design across the fleet, ensuring correctness and performance.

Join a world-class team and work hybrid in Helsinki, contributing to scalable, production-grade systems used by leading AI teams.

Qualifications

• Senior-level software experience in networking and systems.
• Strong Go or willingness to switch from another language.
• Experience with distributed systems and production reliability.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement networking features end to end.
• Extend the dataplane close to hardware.
• Own control plane design in Go across the fleet.
• Transition prototypes to product with docs and quotas.
• Monitor performance and diagnose issues end-to-end.
• Debug issues from hardware to control plane.
• Own metrics, alerting, upgrades and rollback.
• Collaborate with hardware and network design teams.

Skills

Go

Systems programming

Distributed systems

Production experience

Cloud networking

End-to-end ownership

Tools

DPDK

XDP

BlueField

Linux networking

Job description

At Verda, we're building a full-stack AI cloud, covering everything from data centers and hardware to our own cloud platform that the world's leading AI teams use to do serious AI work.

We strive to make a positive mark on the world through the infrastructure we build and give leading teams a service they can truly depend on. Headquartered in Helsinki, we operate globally with offices in London and San Francisco.

Join Verda while it's still being built - not once it's finished.

About the role

Verda builds and operates its own SDN stack. Both the control plane and the dataplane are developed in house by a dedicated team. As the platform grows, so does what customers expect from it, and this role exists to turn our networking layer into a complete set of products: private networks, load balancing, and firewalls that hold up under real traffic.

The job spans both halves of the stack. You'll work in C on the dataplane and in Go on the distributed control plane that drives it. We're looking for someone who enjoys low level work and chasing performance, and who's fine picking up the parts they haven't done before.

Your responsibilities

• Design and implement networking features end to end, from the packet path through to the API customers call.

• Build and extend the dataplane, working close to the hardware.

• Own control plane design in Go: how network state is stored, reconciled, and applied across the fleet without a window where a tenant's traffic ends up somewhere it shouldn't.

• Take features from working prototype to product, with limits, quotas, and customer documentation.

• Keep an eye on performance. Our customers run demanding workloads and notice small regressions.

• Debug problems that run from hardware up through the control plane, often with a customer waiting.

• Own the operational side: metrics, alerting, upgrades, rollback.

• Work with neighboring teams on hardware specs and network design.

Your key competencies

• Strong Go, or systems experience in another language plus the appetite to switch. Go is our primary language.

• Production experience writing performance sensitive systems code in a low level language.

• Experience with distributed systems where state correctness is the hard part.

• 6+ years building and operating production systems software.

• Solid grounding in cloud networking primitives as products: VPC, load balancers, firewalls.

• Comfortable owning a system end to end, without an SRE team catching things behind you.

Nice to have

• High performance packet processing frameworks: DPDK, DOCA, XDP, eBPF, or a vendor SDK.

• DPU or SmartNIC platforms and offload models, including BlueField.

• Linux networking and virtualization: netdev, tc, nftables, namespaces, SR-IOV.

• Upstream contributions to the kernel, DPDK, or other open source networking projects.

Why Verda

• Cash and equity compensation along with various fringe benefits (healthcare, lunch, wellbeing, and more).

• Profitable operations with rapid, sustained growth.

• 30+ nationalities, with 6 different ones on the management team.

• A real chance to make an impact and work alongside world class engineers, researchers, and partners across the global AI ecosystem.

Practicalities

• Work mode: Hybrid, 3 days a week in Helsinki

• Level: Senior

• Employment type: Full-time and permanent