Lead Architect – Application Security

F5 Networks, Inc.; San Jose (CA); Hybrid; USD 297,600 - 446,400; Full time

Job summary

F5 is seeking a Senior Architect for Application Security to lead strategy across WAAP, DDoS mitigation, API security, TLS inspection, and identity‑aware access. You will unify architectural direction across SaaS, hardware, and cloud‑native platforms, ensuring secure‑by‑design, scalable services.

You will modernize legacy systems, guiding cross‑functional teams, and representing F5’s security vision in customer briefings and industry forums.

Qualifications

• 20+ years in software and security architecture roles.
• At least 10 years focused on application‑layer security.
• Strong understanding of TLS, OAuth2/OIDC, SAML, and IAM.
• Experience with cloud‑native platforms and multi‑cloud environments.

Responsibilities

• Define cross‑portfolio application security architecture strategy for hardware, software and cloud‑native solutions.
• Lead modernization from monolithic appliances to API‑driven SaaS security controls.
• Mentor senior architects and engineers to raise security talent.
• Represent F5’s security vision in customer briefings, industry forums, and regulatory discussions.

Skills

WAAP architecture

DDoS mitigation

API security

TLS inspection

Zero Trust

Kubernetes

Leadership

Job description

At F5, we strive to bring a better digital world to life. Our teams empower organizations across the globe to create, secure, and run applications that enhance how we experience our evolving digital world. We are passionate about cybersecurity, from protecting consumers from fraud to enabling companies to focus on innovation. Everything we do centers around people. That means we obsess over how to make the lives of our customers, and their customers, better. And it means we prioritize a diverse F5 community where each individual can thrive.

Job Description

F5 is seeking a Senior Architect for Application Security to lead technical strategy and architecture across its entire security portfolio, including WAF, DDoS mitigation, AI Security, Bot Defense, API Security, TLS inspection, and identity‑aware access. This role drives the evolution of F5’s security services across SaaS, hardware, and cloud‑native platforms, ensuring they are integrated, scalable, and secure‑by‑design. As a senior technical leader, you will unify architectural direction, modernise legacy systems, and represent F5’s security vision in both internal strategy and external engagements.

• Define the cross‑portfolio application security architecture strategy, covering hardware, software, and cloud‑native solutions, and align it to F5’s long‑term business and technology vision.
• Establish architectural principles, patterns, and roadmaps that guide how WAF, WAAP, API security, DDoS, identity, client‑side protection, AI/ML‑powered detection and response, and related capabilities are designed, integrated, and delivered.
• Lead architectural modernization efforts to evolve monolithic or appliance‑based capabilities into composable, API‑driven services within a SaaS‑native security control plane.
• Influence the security posture and innovation roadmap across F5 Distributed Cloud Services, BIG‑IP, NGINX, and future platform initiatives.
• Champion architectural governance and threat modeling across teams to ensure scalability, observability, resiliency, and secure‑by‑default practices are institutionalised.
• Drive cross‑functional alignment across product, engineering, SRE, and infrastructure teams to ensure seamless and secure user experiences across hybrid, multicloud, and edge deployments.
• Mentor a community of senior architects and engineers, raising the bar for application security talent across the company.
• Represent F5’s technical vision in customer briefings, industry forums, regulatory discussions, and analyst engagements, serving as a technical ambassador for application security innovation.

Job Duties and Responsibilities

• Design and validate architecture for WAAP services, distributed DDoS protection layers, advanced bot mitigation pipelines, client fingerprinting, fraud prevention engines, and access‑aware enforcement controls.
• Develop and evangelize reusable security frameworks and patterns across the product portfolio.
• Collaborate with detection teams and data scientists to integrate machine learning, heuristics, and behavior analysis engines into runtime defense systems.
• Define telemetry, feedback loops, and attack modeling infrastructure to continuously improve detection fidelity and response agility.
• Work across organizational boundaries to ensure integration of security across the portfolio.
• Guide compliance, privacy, and regulatory alignment by ensuring architecture supports evolving standards such as FIPS, FedRAMP, NIST CSF, ISO 27001, GDPR, and OWASP.
• Drive architectural reviews, design validations, and threat models to ensure operational, security, and scalability concerns are addressed early.
• Planning, tracking and scheduling software deliverables.

Skills and Qualifications

• 20+ years of experience in software and security architecture roles, with at least 10 years focused specifically on application‑layer security.
• Proven track record architecting complex security systems in domains such as WAAP, API security, DDoS mitigation, bot protection, and malware detection.
• Deep understanding of L7 protocols (HTTP/2, HTTP/3, WebSockets, gRPC) and application security standards (OWASP Top 10, NIST, MITRE ATT&CK).
• Strong technical understanding of TLS, certificate management, identity and access protocols (OAuth2, OIDC, SAML), and secure session management.
• Familiarity with zero trust architectures, policy‑as‑code, multi‑tenant SaaS designs, and runtime enforcement in container‑based platforms (Kubernetes, Istio, Envoy).
• Demonstrated ability to set architectural strategy across product boundaries and influence senior engineering and product leadership.
• Experience designing and implementing distributed cloud solutions at scale.
• Understanding of containers and orchestration technologies.
• Broad understanding of coding and programming languages.
• Extensive knowledge of the software development process and corresponding technologies.
• Excellent understanding of design patterns and architectural styles.
• Proficient knowledge of the operation and development designs of agile software.
• Strong soft skills, including attention to detail, problem‑solving and communication skills.

The Job Description is intended to be a general representation of the responsibilities and requirements of the job. However, the description may not be all‑inclusive, and responsibilities and requirements are subject to change.

The annual base pay for this position is: $297,600.00 - $446,400.00 F5 maintains broad salary ranges for its roles in order to account for variations in knowledge, skills, experience, geographic locations, and market conditions, as well as to reflect F5’s differing products, industries, and lines of business. The pay range referenced is as of the time of the job posting and is subject to change. You may also be offered incentive compensation, bonus, restricted stock units, and benefits. More details about F5’s benefits can be found at the following link: https://www.f5.com/company/careers/benefits. F5 reserves the right to change or terminate any benefit plan without notice. Please note that F5 only contacts candidates through F5 email address (ending with @f5.com) or auto email notification from Workday (ending with f5.com or @myworkday.com).

Equal Employment Opportunity

It is the policy of F5 to provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and employment applicants without regard to unlawful considerations of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, sensory, physical, or mental disability, marital status, veteran or military status, genetic information, or any other classification protected by applicable local, state, or federal laws. This policy applies to all aspects of employment, including, but not limited to, hiring, job assignment, compensation, promotion, benefits, training, discipline, and termination. F5 offers a variety of reasonable accommodations for candidates. Requesting an accommodation is completely voluntary. F5 will assess the need for accommodations in the application process separately from those that may be needed to perform the job. Request by contacting [e-mail].

Hybrid: Employees within 30 commutable miles of an F5 office are required to work from the office a minimum of 30 business days per quarter. Remote: Primarily work from designated home location but can come into an F5 office to work or travel to an offsite location as needed.

Together, we’re building a better digital world. Founded in 1996, F5 is a global leader in application delivery and security. Our premier platform helps customers secure and deliver every app, API, and piece of infrastructure across all environments. Backed by over three decades of expertise and 553 patents, our solutions protect against threats while ensuring fast, reliable digital experiences. With over 6,400 employees, we serve more than 23,000 customers in over 170 countries. To continue this work, we need people like you—the best minds in the industry. We’re committed to a unique, human‑first culture that encourages authenticity, prioritizes diversity and inclusion, and fosters the growth and success of our employees.