AI Infrastructure Engineer, Sandbox Platform

Scale AI; Seattle, New York, San Francisco (WA, NY, CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 225,000; Full time

Job summary

Scale AI is seeking a Software Engineer for the AI Infrastructure team to build and evolve our agent sandboxing platform, a secure, high-performance code execution layer powering agentic workflows across internal and customer-managed environments.

You’ll combine deep systems expertise with a strong focus on developer experience, partnering with internal teams to shape a roadmap and deliver end-to-end projects from design through deployment in a fast-paced setting.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of experience building high-performance systems software.
• Strong knowledge of Linux process isolation, memory management, cgroups and namespaces.
• Experience with containerization/virtualization tech (Docker, Firecracker, gVisor, QEMU, Kata Containers).
• Proficiency in Go, Rust, or C/C++.
• Obsessed with developer experience: API design, error propagation and clear docs.

Responsibilities

• Design and build the sandboxing platform, client library, and API surface for secure code execution across containerized and virtualized environments.
• Ensure strong isolation, security and reproducibility of execution across user sessions and workloads.
• Optimize for cold-start latency, memory footprint and resource utilization at scale.
• Drive down error rates through systematic debugging, monitoring and proactive fixes.
• Partner with internal teams to understand needs, debug issues and build tooling that serves their use cases.
• Respond to incidents and production issues with urgency, performing root cause analysis and preventive fixes.
• Help develop and maintain a product roadmap for sandboxing balancing immediate needs with long-term architecture.
• Lead architecture reviews and own projects end-to-end from design through deployment.

Skills

Linux internals

Developer experience

Performance optimization

Debugging

Ambiguity tolerance

Education

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

Firecracker

gVisor

QEMU

Kata Containers

Go

Rust

C/C++

Job description

As a Software Engineer on the AI Infrastructure team, you'll help build and evolve our agent sandboxing platform — the secure, high-performance code execution layer powering our agentic workflows, deployed across both internal and customer-managed environments. This is a role for someone who cares as much about the experience of the engineers and researchers using this system as they do about the kernel internals underneath it.

You’ll combine deep systems expertise (isolation, virtualization, performance) with an obsession for developer experience: clean APIs, clear error messages, good docs, and a client library that feels well-crafted. You’ll partner closely with internal teams to understand how they use the platform, debug their issues, and shape a roadmap that balances immediate needs with long-term architecture.

You will:

• Design and build the sandboxing platform, client library, and API surface for secure code execution across containerized and virtualized environments
• Ensure strong isolation, security, and reproducibility of execution across user sessions and workloads
• Optimize for cold-start latency, memory footprint, and resource utilization at scale
• Drive down error rates through systematic debugging, monitoring, and proactive fixes
• Partner closely with internal teams using the platform to understand their needs, debug issues, and build tooling that serves their use cases
• Respond to incidents and production issues with urgency, conducting root cause analysis and implementing preventive fixes
• Help develop and maintain a product roadmap for sandboxing, balancing immediate needs against long-term architectural investment
• Lead architecture reviews and own projects end-to-end, from design through deployment, in fast-paced cross-functional settings

Ideally you'd have:

• 4+ years of experience building high-performance systems software, with meaningful time spent maintaining libraries, SDKs, or developer-facing APIs
• Deep understanding of Linux internals: process isolation, memory management, cgroups, namespaces, etc.
• Experience with containerization and virtualization technologies (e.g., Docker, Firecracker, gVisor, QEMU, Kata Containers)
• Proficiency in a systems programming language such as Go, Rust, or C/C++
• A track record of obsessing over developer experience — API design, error propagation, documentation, and the small details that make a library feel well-crafted
• Comfort working across infrastructure layers, from kernel modules to orchestration frameworks (e.g., Kubernetes)
• Strong debugging skills and the ability to navigate performance/security tradeoffs in production systems
• Comfort with ambiguity, and the ability to context-switch between reactive incident work and proactive product development

Nice to haves:

• Experience as a founder or early engineer at an infrastructure-focused startup, owning a product end-to-end
• Familiarity with LLM agents and agent frameworks (e.g., OpenHands, Agent2Agent, MCP)
• Experience running secure workloads in multi-tenant or untrusted environments (e.g., FaaS, CI sandboxes, remote notebooks)
• Exposure to snapshotting and restore techniques (e.g., CRIU, VM snapshots, overlayfs)
• Open-source contributions to systems or developer-tools projects
• History of on-call/incident response for production systems

Compensation packages at Scale for eligible roles include base salary, equity, and benefits. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the position and may be inclusive of several career levels at Scale; it will be determined during the interview process based on work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, qualifications, interview performance, and relevant education or training. Scale employees in eligible roles are also granted equity based compensation, subject to Board of Director approval. You'll also receive benefits including, but not limited to: comprehensive health, dental and vision coverage, retirement benefits, a learning and development stipend, and generous PTO. Additionally, this role may be eligible for additional benefits such as a commuter stipend.

$180,000 - $225,000 USD

PLEASE NOTE: Our policy requires a 90-day waiting period before reconsidering candidates for the same role. This allows us to ensure a fair and thorough evaluation of all applicants.

We believe that everyone should be able to bring their whole selves to work, which is why we are proud to be an inclusive and equal opportunity workplace. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability status, gender identity or Veteran status.

We are committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with physical and mental disabilities. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation in the application or recruiting process due to a disability, please contact us at [e-mail]. Please see the United States Department of Labor’s Know Your Rights poster for additional information.

We comply with the United States Department of Labor's Pay Transparency provision.

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