Senior Cloud Engineer

Engg; Milpitas (CA); On-site; USD 168,000 - 245,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco is seeking a senior data/DevOps-focused engineer to design and deploy large-scale data solutions across Cassandra, Kafka, and OpenSearch in hybrid AWS and private clouds. You will collaborate with global teams of engineers and SREs to ensure reliability and performance for Webex and collaboration services.

The role emphasizes automation with Terraform, Ansible, and Kubernetes, plus guiding data access patterns and migration strategies for cloud-native applications.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree and 8+ years with distributed databases (Cassandra/OpenSearch/Kafka).
• 5+ years managing AWS infrastructure at scale.
• 5+ years with CI/CD and IaC tools like Terraform, Ansible, Kubernetes.
• Python 5+ years supporting live SaaS systems.
• 3+ years leading technical projects with estimation and milestones.

Responsibilities

• Architect and deploy large-scale data solutions across Cassandra, Kafka, OpenSearch.
• Automate cloud infra with Terraform, Ansible, Kubernetes.
• Ensure reliability with backups, patching, incident management.
• Advise teams on data access patterns and cloud migration.

Skills

Distributed data systems

AWS at scale

DevOps CI/CD

Python

Project leadership

Education

Bachelor's degree or higher

Tools

Terraform

Ansible

Kubernetes

Jenkins

GitHub Actions

GitLab CI

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 10/12/2026. This position will perform work that the U.S. government has specified can only be performed by a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil.

Meet the Team. Cisco’s Collaboration Business Unit empowers people and organizations worldwide to connect, communicate, and innovate seamlessly. You will collaborate with a global team of software engineers and SREs responsible for delivering extraordinary collaboration experiences at scale. Our team supports backend services deployed worldwide and works closely with development, product, and operations partners to ensure reliability and performance. Webex is powering the shift to the hybrid workforce, helping people stay connected in a rapidly evolving digital world. We cultivate a startup-like culture that values innovation, ownership, and collaboration, while offering the scale and impact of a global technology leader.

Your Impact

As a distributed big data enthusiast, you’ll architect and deploy resilient, large-scale data solutions across Cassandra, Kafka, and OpenSearch in hybrid AWS and private cloud environments. You’ll automate cloud infrastructure with Terraform, Ansible, and Kubernetes, optimize high-throughput systems for scale and performance, and strengthen reliability through automated backups, security patching, and incident management. As a trusted technical partner, you’ll also guide application teams on data access patterns and cloud migration strategies.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelors and 8+ years hands on experience (deploy, monitor, scale, and upgrades) with a distributed database technology such as CassandraDB, Opensearch, Kafka, PostgreSQL, or Redis.
• 5+ Years managing AWS infrastructure at scale.
• 5+ Years experience with infrastructure automation and DevOps practices such as CI/CD tools (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI) and Infrastructure as Code tools (Terraform, Ansible, Kubernetes).
• Python 5+ years experience supporting live production systems for customer facing software as a service.
• 3+ years of experience leading technical projects, including responsibility for task estimation, milestone tracking, and stakeholder communication processes.

Preferred Qualifications

• Exposure to modern data platforms including data pipelines, streaming systems, AL/ML and GenAI workloads.
• Experience writing data driven applications in Java or Python and familiarity with data access patterns in software.
• Experience in regulated US Federal environments.

Why Cisco?

At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint. Fueled by the depth and breadth of our technology, we experiment and create meaningful solutions. Add to that our worldwide network of doers and experts, and you’ll see that the opportunities to grow and build are limitless. We work as a team, collaborating with empathy to make really big things happen on a global scale. Because our solutions are everywhere, our impact is everywhere. We are Cisco, and our power starts with you.

Message to applicants applying to work in the U.S. and/or Canada

The starting salary range posted for this position is $167,700.00 to $245,200.00 and reflects the projected salary range for new hires in this position in U.S. and/or Canada locations, not including incentive compensation*, equity, or benefits. Individual pay is determined by the candidate's hiring location, market conditions, job-related skillset, experience, qualifications, education, certifications, and/or training. The full salary range for certain locations is listed below. For locations not listed below, the recruiter can share more details about compensation for the role in your location during the hiring process.

U.S. employees are offered benefits, subject to Cisco’s plan eligibility rules, which include medical, dental and vision insurance, a 401(k) plan with a Cisco matching contribution, paid parental leave, short and long-term disability coverage, and basic life insurance. Please see the Cisco careers site to discover more benefits and perks. Employees may be eligible to receive grants of Cisco restricted stock units, which vest following continued employment with Cisco for defined periods of time. U.S. employees are eligible for paid time away as described below, subject to Cisco’s policies: 10 paid holidays per full calendar year, plus 1 floating holiday for non-exempt employees 1 paid day off for employee’s birthday, paid year-end holiday shutdown, and 4 paid days off for personal wellness determined by Cisco Non‑exempt employees** receive 16 days of paid vacation time per full calendar year, accrued at rate of 4.92 hours per pay period for full-time employees Exempt employees participate in Cisco’s flexible vacation time off program, which has no defined limit on how much vacation time eligible employees may use (subject to availability and some business limitations) 80 hours of sick time off provided on hire date and each January 1st thereafter, and up to 80 hours of unused sick time carried forward from one calendar year to the next Additional paid time away may be requested to deal with critical or emergency issues for family members Optional 10 paid days per full calendar year to volunteer For non-sales roles, employees are also eligible to earn annual bonuses subject to Cisco’s policies. Employees on sales plans earn performance-based incentive pay on top of their base salary, which is split between quota and non-quota components, subject to the applicable Cisco plan. For quota-based incentive pay, Cisco typically pays as follows: .75% of incentive target for each 1% of revenue attainment up to 50% of quota; 1.5% of incentive target for e