Associate Principal / Principal Engineer - .NET + Azure + AI

QBurst; Kerala; On-site; INR 4,000,000 - 7,200,000; Full time

Job summary

QBurst is seeking an Associate Principal / Principal Engineer to own the architecture of our .NET 8+ microservices and event-driven platform in India. You will lead design, set patterns, and ensure clean architecture and robust testing.

You will work with Azure, Kafka, PostgreSQL or SQL Server, Kubernetes, and S3-compatible storage to build scalable, high-quality services. Strong leadership and hands-on coding are required.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of software engineering experience.
• Expert in ASP.NET Core APIs, microservices, and Clean Architecture.
• Strong experience with Azure, Kafka, SQL Server/PostgreSQL, and Kubernetes.
• Solid testing, logging, and quality gates (SonarQube).

Responsibilities

• Own backend architecture and technical direction across microservices and event-driven systems.
• Lead design reviews and set patterns for Clean Architecture and testing.
• Unblock complex work, including messaging, data, and distributed orchestration.
• Guide engineers through pairing, reviews, and technical decisions.
• Shape service packaging and deployment on Kubernetes from a developer viewpoint.
• Drive RAG/vector retrieval design and implementation with core APIs and pipelines.

Skills

ASP.NET Core

C#

Clean Architecture

Azure

Kafka

REST APIs

gRPC

Kubernetes

Docker

SQL Server

PostgreSQL

SignalR

WebSockets

Redis

CI/CD

Tools

Azure DevOps

SonarQube

CI/CD tooling

S3-compatible storage

Job description

We are looking for an Associate Principal / Principal Engineer with 10+ years of experience to own the architecture of our .NET 8+ microservices and event-driven platform. The ideal candidate combines deep .NET experience with Azure, Kafka, PostgreSQL or SQL Server, Kubernetes, and clean, well-tested design.

Responsibilities

• Own backend architecture and technical direction across microservices and event-driven systems
• Lead design reviews, set patterns, and keep the bar high on Clean Architecture, DI, testing, and SonarQube gates
• Unblock complex work yourself when needed — messaging, data, distributed orchestration, realtime paths
• Guide engineers through pairing, reviews, and clear technical decisions
• Shape how services are packaged and run on Kubernetes from a developer viewpoint (not cluster admin)
• Drive RAG / vector retrieval design and implementation alongside core APIs and pipelines

Requirements

• Strong hands-on experience building ASP.NET Core APIs, background workers, and message consumers with .NET 8+ and C#, applying Clean Architecture
• Strong hands-on experience building event-driven and real-time systems using Apache Kafka, SignalR or WebSockets, and Redis
• Solid hands-on experience with PostgreSQL or SQL Server (mandatory)
• Experience with Azure DevOps, Docker, and SonarQube, and you build quality into services through structured logging and unit tests
• Developer-level Kubernetes experience, including Deployments, Services, ConfigMaps, Secrets, health probes, and resource management, and you can debug with logs and deploy services through CI
• Worked with S3-compatible object storage in production services
• Designed and built REST and gRPC APIs, defining service boundaries contract-first
• Built Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) solutions using vector stores, ingestion pipelines with chunking and embeddings, and query APIs