Senior Linux Kernel Engineer - Remote & Impactful

Akamai Career Site; United States; Hybrid; USD 146,000 - 264,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

FlexBase program

Work from home options

Job summary

Akamai is seeking a Senior II Software Engineer for the Linux Infrastructure team to build and maintain a custom Linux kernel powering Akamai Cloud Platform across a global network.

You will develop new features for performance, reliability, and security, port changes to newer kernel versions, debug complex environments, and collaborate with platform, test, and hardware teams while upstreaming work.

This role requires 8+ years of experience, strong C skills, and excellence in communication.

Qualifications

• 8 years of relevant experience and a Bachelor's degree or its equivalent.
• 3+ years of C software development with Linux kernel focus and scripting (Perl/Python/Shell).
• Solid understanding of Linux kernel internals and kernel debugging.
• Familiar with at least two subsystems: memory management, filesystems, block IO, TCP/IP, or KVM.
• Comfortable with x86 and ARM architectures.
• Strong knowledge of concurrent programming, data structures, algorithms, and network protocols (TCP/UDP/IP, Ethernet, QUIC, HTTP/TLS).
• Self-starter who collaborates well and communicates clearly.

Responsibilities

• Developing new features to improve performance, reliability, and security of Akamai Cloud Platform
• Porting existing Akamai modifications to newer versions of Linux kernel
• Debugging and fixing issues found in a variety of complex test and production environments
• Enhancing existing build and test automation to facilitate Continuous Testing
• Collaborating closely with platform and application developer and test teams as well as Akamai hardware development teams
• Working with the open source community to upstream your work
• Staying current with upstream Linux kernel and OS changes and emerging industry trends

Skills

C programming

Linux kernel development

Kernel debugging

Scripting (Perl/Python/Shell)

Linux internals

Concurrency

Networking TCP/IP

Education

Bachelor's degree

Job description

Akamai is seeking a Senior II Software Engineer for the Linux Infrastructure team to build and maintain a custom Linux kernel powering Akamai Cloud Platform across a global network.

You will develop new features for performance, reliability, and security, port changes to newer kernel versions, debug complex environments, and collaborate with platform, test, and hardware teams while upstreaming work.

This role requires 8+ years of experience, strong C skills, and excellence in communication.