Sales Engineer

Azul; Boston (MA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Azul is seeking a Sales Engineer in the Boston area to lead technical validation with enterprise customers. The role blends deep Java/JVM expertise with hands-on pilots, performance benchmarking, and clear business value communication.

You will collaborate with Account Executives, product, and CTO offices to win complex deals, travel up to 30%, and mentor the broader SE team while expanding Azul's footprint in large JVM-based estates.

Qualifications

• 5+ years in a Sales Engineering / pre-sales role.
• 3+ years of hands-on Java development or testing experience.
• Proven track record of hands-on pilots and POCs.
• Experience selling into large enterprises.
• Bachelor’s degree (or equivalent) in Software Engineering/CS; master’s a plus.

Responsibilities

• Own the technical win through end-to-end pre-sales engagements.
• Lead hands-on pilots and POCs in customer environments.
• Plan and run performance-focused engagements and benchmarks.
• Coordinate validation across teams and environments for large estates.
• Present demos to executives and hands-on developers.
• Respond to RFI/RFP with aligned Azul capabilities.
• Engage Product Management and CTO office to remove blockers.
• Collaborate on territory strategy with Account Executives.
• Grow and retain customers through success and upsell opportunities.
• Speak at conferences and build Azul funnel.
• Mentor other SEs and onboarding.

Skills

Java & JVM

Performance engineering

Hands-on aptitude

Enterprise stacks

Cloud & containers

Portfolio SME

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Tools

AWS

Docker

Kubernetes

Salesforce CRM

Job description

About the Role

The Azul Sales Engineer is a hands‑on, deeply technical pre‑sales leader responsible for delivering the technical win across opportunities within their territory. Azul sells to the most demanding Java estates in the world—enterprises running mission‑critical, high‑throughput, latency‑sensitive applications on the JVM—so this role demands genuine engineering depth, not just presentation polish.

A Sales Engineer earns credibility with engineers, architects, and executives alike by getting hands on: running technical evaluations in the customer’s own environment, tuning the JVM, interpreting GC and performance data, and translating measurable technical outcomes into clear business value. Beyond individual deals, the Sales Engineer uses their experience to mentor and uplevel the broader SE team.

What You’ll Do

• Own the technical win. Drive pre‑sales engagements end to end—discovery of the prospect’s business and technical challenges, mapping Azul portfolio capabilities to those challenges, and validating the solution through demonstration and hands‑on proof.
• Lead hands‑on pilots. Design, scope, and personally execute product pilots and proofs‑of‑concept inside the customer’s existing environment: installing and configuring the JVM, running representative workloads, and capturing empirical results the customer trusts.
• Prove performance. Plan and run performance‑focused engagements: establish benchmarks and success criteria, measure latency, throughput, GC pause behavior and resource efficiency, analyze GC and JIT logs, tune JVM settings, and quantify the improvement Azul delivers against the incumbent.
• Win at enterprise scale. Navigate complex, multi‑stakeholder enterprise engagements (large production estates, strict SLAs, security and compliance review, and long procurement cycles) coordinating technical validation across many teams and environments.
• Present at every altitude. Deliver presentations and demos across all technical levels, from CxOs to hands‑on developers, to “make the complex simple” and communicate Azul’s value to each audience.
• Respond to technical requirements. Understand and respond to solicited and unsolicited proposals (RFI/RFP) by aligning Azul capabilities against detailed technical and business requirements.
• Orchestrate the extended team. Engage Product Management, Engineering, and the CTO office as needed to remove technical blockers and secure the win.
• Partner on territory strategy. Work alongside your Account Executive(s) on territory planning: pipeline generation, growing existing accounts, and enabling partners.
• Grow and retain customers. Nurture existing clients to promote customer success and to create new upsell and cross‑sell opportunities.
• Evangelize. Present at conferences, workshops, and roadshows to raise awareness of the Azul portfolio and build funnel.
• Mentor the team. Provide expert assistance to other SEs on pilot planning and execution, run training sessions, and serve as a primary mentor to onboarding SEs.
• Be a trusted advisor. Advise your manager on product, territory, and team matters.

Technical Competencies

These are the core technical strengths that define a successful Sales Engineer at Azul:

• Java & the JVM. Deep, hands‑on knowledge of Java internals and the JVM: class loading, JIT compilation, memory model, and garbage collection. Able to read and reason about GC logs and runtime behavior, not just describe them.
• Performance engineering. Practical experience benchmarking, profiling, and tuning JVM‑based applications for latency, throughput, and scale; comfortable diagnosing GC pauses, warm‑up, jitter, and resource‑efficiency issues in production‑like conditions.
• Hands‑on aptitude. Confident on the command line and in customer environments: installing, configuring, and troubleshooting runtimes; able to build and run a POC independently.
• Enterprise application stacks. Solid understanding of Java‑based applications and frameworks that run on or alongside Azul products (e.g., Cassandra, Kafka, Solr, Spring).
• Cloud & containers. Working knowledge of cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, Azure, GCP) and container/orchestration technologies (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes).
• Portfolio SME. Demonstrate SME‑level depth and breadth across the entire Azul product suite, and continuously grow technical acumen through enablement, hands‑on experimentation, and self‑study.

Qualifications

• 5+ years in a Sales Engineering / pre‑sales role supporting enterprise software, ideally in the Java, middleware, performance, or infrastructure space.
• 3+ years of hands‑on Java development or testing experience with a demonstrable command of Java architecture.
• Proven track record of hands‑on pilots and POCs and of performance‑related engagements where you measured and demonstrated technical results in a customer environment.
• Experience selling into large enterprises—complex, multi‑stakeholder, mission‑critical production environments.
• Bachelor’s degree (or equivalent) in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or a related IT discipline; a master’s or higher in an IT or business discipline is a plus.
• Working knowledge of cloud and container technologies (e.g., AWS, Docker/Kubernetes).
• Solid knowledge of sales process and CRM (MEDDICC and Salesforce preferred).
• Willing and able to travel up to 30%.
• Fluent in your territory’s primary language, with strong professional English.

Skills & Attributes

• Strong oral and written communication, effective one‑on‑one and in front of large groups.
• Proven critical‑thinking and problem‑solving skills; able to solve complex technical challenges with minimal supervision.
• Highly organized, detail‑oriented, with excellent time management.
• Highly professional and ethical.
• Thrives in a fast‑paced environment and can multitask across client challenges, meetings, and team needs, occasionally outside normal business hours.
• Collaborates across disciplines, with the EQ to understand multiple perspectives toward a common goal.
• A proven winning record.

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, or assessing responses and identifying potential inconsistencies or verification signals in application materials based on available information. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed, please contact us.