Principal Engineer - Network (Remote)

CrowdStrike Inc.; Kansas; Hybrid; CAD 278,000 - 414,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation

Equity awards

Wellness programs

Paid parental leave

Professional development

Volunteer opportunities

Diversity & inclusion

Job summary

CrowdStrike Inc. seeks a senior architect to own the IP and optical backbone architecture globally, shaping a multi-year roadmap, traffic engineering, capacity planning, and demand forecasting.

You will influence vendor roadmaps and mentor engineers across datacenter, application, and business teams. You will drive network automation and IaC strategy, telemetry analytics, and explore frontier AI models for proactive operations, while maintaining data in-house.

Qualifications

• Extensive backbone network design and operations experience.
• Deep expertise in IP/MPLS core technologies and SR-MPLS/SRv6.
• Strong background in optical transport and DWDM systems.
• Proven ability to lead multi-vendor network projects and roadmaps.
• Experience with cloud networking and multi-cloud/hybrid architectures.
• Hands-on with IaC, automation tooling, and telemetry analytics.

Responsibilities

• Own platform selection for routing/optical hardware and influence vendor roadmaps.
• Set direction for network automation and telemetry analytics strategy.
• Mentor senior engineers and establish engineering standards.
• Lead capacity planning, demand forecasting, and 24x7 on-call incident support.
• Apply AI models to network operations with secure data handling.

Skills

Backbone networks

IP/MPLS core

Optical transport

Cloud networking

IaC / automation

AI in networking

Network automation

Vendor collaboration

Security architecture

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/related field

Tools

Juniper

Infinera

Nokia

Arista

Cisco

Terraform

Ansible

GitOps

Job description

USA - Remote, CA

Full time

R30292

As a global leader in cybersecurity, CrowdStrike protects the people, processes and technologies that drive modern organizations. Since 2011, our mission hasn’t changed — we’re here to stop breaches, and we’ve redefined modern security with the world’s most advanced AI-native platform. We work on large scale distributed systems, processing almost 3 trillion events per day and this traffic is growing daily. Our customers span all industries, and they count on CrowdStrike to keep their businesses running, their communities safe and their lives moving forward. We're proud to work for a mission-driven company leveraging AI to transform the way we work. CrowdStrikers drive their careers through flexibility and autonomy while also being expected to contribute to a culture of responsible AI adoption, experimentation, and innovation. We use an AI-first mindset as a force multiplier to proactively and continuously accelerate execution, build expertise, uncover insights, and solve complex problems. We’re always looking to add talented CrowdStrikers to the team who have limitless passion, a relentless focus on innovation and a fanatical commitment to our customers, our community and each other. Ready to join a mission that matters? The future of cybersecurity starts with you.

About the Role:

You will own the IP and optical architecture for CrowdStrike's global backbone, including connectivity to traditional and neocloud providers. You'll set the multi-year roadmap governing its evolution, including traffic engineering strategy, capacity planning, and demand forecasting for the network as a whole. You'll drive the initiatives that matter most to the business, from funding case through implementation and long-term operational stewardship, and act as the senior escalation resource in the 24x7 on-call rotation when an incident exceeds the depth of the engineers already on it.

What You'll Do:

You'll own platform selection for routing and optical hardware, working directly with vendor engineering teams to influence their roadmaps, and engage director- and VP-level stakeholders across datacenter, application, and business teams to keep network strategy ahead of the company's growth. You'll set the direction for network automation and infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, Ansible, CI/CD, GitOps), and for telemetry and analytics strategy, increasingly including frontier and open-weight AI models for tasks like telemetry analysis and automated triage, with sensitive backbone data kept in-house. Part of the role is raising the technical bar of the organization: reviewing senior engineers' designs, setting the standards they build against, and mentoring them toward this level.

What You'll Need:

• US Citizenship or Green Card holder status
• 12+ years designing, building, and operating large-scale backbone networks, with ownership of architecture at global scale
• Deep expertise in IP/MPLS core technologies: IS-IS, MP-BGP, segment routing (SR-MPLS/SRv6), PE/P architectures, MPLS-TE, VRFs, DDoS mitigation, CDN
• Deep expertise in optical transport: DWDM, coherent optics (400G/800G), ROADM architectures, amplifier design (EDFA/Raman), dispersion management, alien wavelengths
• Strong grounding in cloud networking: direct connectivity, multi-cloud routing, and hybrid cloud at scale across major hyperscalers (AWS, GCP, OCI, Azure) and neoclouds (e.g., CoreWeave, Cerebras)
• Working depth in adjacent infrastructure domains (virtualization, containers, databases, message queuing, large-scale provisioning) sufficient to architect across boundaries
• Proven ability to set, not just execute, network automation and IaC strategy
• Familiarity with applying frontier and open-weight AI models to network operations (e.g., telemetry analysis, automated triage, ChatOps tooling), including self-hosting open-weight models where data sensitivity requires it
• Experience operating or architecting networks within FedRAMP-authorized environments
• Track record of selecting, testing, and deploying networking hardware and software organization-wide, across major vendors (Juniper, Infinera, Nokia, Arista, Cisco, etc.)
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Management Information Systems, or a related field, or equivalent experience
• Proven experience utilizing AI technologies to enhance decision-making, streamline workflows and processes, improve efficiency and drive business outcomes.

Benefits of Working at CrowdStrike:

• Market leader in compensation and equity awards
• Comprehensive physical and mental wellness programs
• Competitive vacation and holidays for recharge
• Paid parental and adoption leaves
• Professional development opportunities for all employees regardless of level or role
• Employee Networks, geographic neighborhood groups, and volunteer opportunities to build connections
• Vibrant office culture with world class amenities
• Great Place to Work Certified™ across the globe

CrowdStrike is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to fostering a culture of belonging where everyone is valued for who they are and empowered to succeed. We support veterans and individuals with disabilities through our affirmative action program.

CrowdStrike is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all employees and applicants for employment. The Company does not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices on the basis of race, color, creed, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy or pregnancy‑related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, marital or family status, veteran status, age, national origin, ancestry, physical disability (including HIV and AIDS), mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, membership or activity in a local human rights commission, status with regard to public assistance, or any other characteristic protected by law. We base all employment decisions--including recruitment, selection, training, compensation, benefits, discipline, promotions, transfers, lay‑offs, return from lay‑off, terminations and social/recreational programs--on valid job requirements.

If you need assistance accessing or reviewing the information on this website or need help submitting an application for employment or requesting an accommodation, please contact us at [e-mail] for further assistance.

Find out more about your rights as an applicant. (http://www.eeoc.gov/sites/default/files/2023-06/22-088_EEOC_KnowYourRights6.12ScreenRdr.pdf)

CrowdStrike participates in the E-Verify program.

Notice of E-Verify Participation (https://www.e-verify.gov/sites/default/files/everify/posters/EVerifyParticipationPoster.pdf)

Right to Work

CrowdStrike, Inc. is committed to fair and equitable compensation practices. Placement within the pay range is dependent on a variety of factors including, but not limited to, relevant work experience, skills, certifications, job level, supervisory status, and location. The base salary range for this position for all U.S. candidates is $195,000 - $290,000 per year, with eligibility for bonuses, equity grants and a comprehensive benefits package that includes health insurance, 401k and paid time off.

For detailed information about the U.S. benefits package, please click here (http://crowdstrike.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/crowdstrikecareers/page/a78c53e64ec61001f47d48a4699e0000) .

CrowdStrike was founded in 2011 to fix a fundamental problem: The sophisticated attacks that were forcing the world’s leading businesses into the headlines could not be solved with existing malware-based defenses. Founder George Kurtz realized that a brand new approach was needed — one that combines the most advanced endpoint protection with expert intelligence to pinpoint the adversaries perpetrating the attacks, not just the malware.

There’s much more to the story of how Falcon has redefined endpoint protection but there’s only one thing to remember about CrowdStrike: We stop breaches.