Senior AI Gateway Engineer - Core API & Systems (Remote)

Kong; United States; Remote; USD 150,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Kong Inc. is seeking a Systems Engineer to design, build, and maintain its core API management stack. You’ll work on proxying, load balancing, and database support, delivering scalable, distributed systems with strong Linux expertise.

You will engage with the open source community, optimize performance, and collaborate with a globally distributed team. A strong background in APIs, networking, and AI concepts is essential.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in server-side programming.
• Experience designing, prototyping, building and debugging scalable distributed systems.
• Strong Linux systems troubleshooting and profiling skills.
• Knowledge of API transportation protocols (L7/L4).
• Comfortable working with a remotely distributed team.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, documentation ownership.
• Familiarity with AI/LLM concepts and applications development.

Responsibilities

• Design, build and maintain API management software and its stack.
• Architect and implement new features including proxying, load balancing, and DB support.
• Troubleshoot bugs, tune performance and optimize low-level code; engage with open source community.
• Bridge Kong with third-party deployment platforms and tooling.
• Handle additional tasks as assigned by management.

Skills

Server-side programming

Distributed systems design

Linux troubleshooting

Networking (L7/L4)

Remote/distributed teamwork

Documentation writing

AI/LLM concepts familiarity

Tools

OpenResty

LuaJIT

NGINX

Envoy

Istio

Rust

Job description

Kong Inc. is seeking a Systems Engineer to design, build, and maintain its core API management stack. You’ll work on proxying, load balancing, and database support, delivering scalable, distributed systems with strong Linux expertise.

You will engage with the open source community, optimize performance, and collaborate with a globally distributed team. A strong background in APIs, networking, and AI concepts is essential.