Senior Principal Data Engineer

MaintainX (An Autodesk Company); San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Job summary

MaintainX, now part of Autodesk, is seeking a Senior Principal Data Engineer to lead the data platform strategy across infrastructure, streaming, Databricks, and governance. You will shape architecture and standards, guiding multiple teams through complex problems with thoughtful judgment.

You will mentor senior engineers, drive cross-squad initiatives, and influence roadmaps while balancing pragmatic solutions with long-term impact in a cloud-native environment.

Qualifications

• 9+ years of experience as a data engineer in a modern, production-grade cloud data platform.

Responsibilities

• Shape the technical direction and architecture of the data platform across its full surface area.

Skills

Python

dbt

Cross-team impact

Architectural judgment

Stakeholder alignment

Tools

Terraform/Atmos

Kafka

Flink

Debezium

Databricks

Job description

MaintainX is a leading mobile-first work execution platform for industrial and frontline teams. More than 13,000 customers, including Duracell, McDonald's, Shell, DHL and Volvo, use MaintainX to cut unplanned downtime and run better operations, across 13.9 million managed assets and 79.5 million completed work orders.

In August 2026 MaintainX became part of Autodesk, joining Autodesk Operations Solutions, the organization unifying Autodesk's operations platform alongside Tandem, FlexSim and Fusion Operations. Autodesk's strategy is to converge design, make and operate into one continuous lifecycle: design an asset, build it, run it, then feed what you learn running it back into the next design. Autodesk had design and make. Operate is the phase that tells you what actually happened, and it is ours.

We are seeking a Senior Principal Data Engineer to join our growing team. Our data platform spans a wide surface area: infrastructure, CDC streaming, Databricks operations and runtime, data pipelines, developer experience, and data governance. We are looking for someone who can exercise meaningful technical leadership across all of it. You will not just deliver solutions; you will frame complex, ambiguous problems, define standards and architectural direction, and ensure teams can make better decisions and deliver more effectively for our stakeholders through your influence and judgment.

What you'll do:

• Shape the technical direction and architecture of the data platform across its full surface area: infrastructure, Databricks, streaming, data products, and governance

• Proactively identify and drive resolution of cross-cutting technical challenges before they become delivery blockers, working across multiple data engineering teams and both internal and customer-facing projects

• Define and evolve platform-wide standards, patterns, and abstractions adopted across teams

• Influence roadmap priorities by framing trade-offs, surfacing opportunities, and driving alignment across engineering, product, and analytics

• Drive adoption of changes across teams, not just their delivery

• Mentor and elevate senior engineers through complex problems and architectural decisions

• Navigate ambiguity and lead complex, multi-squad initiatives with minimal direction

About you:

• 9+ years of experience as a data engineer in a modern, production-grade cloud data platform

• Meaningful exposure across several of the platform's key domains: IaC infrastructure (Terraform/Atmos), CDC streaming (Kafka, Flink, Debezium), Databricks operations, data governance, batch and streaming pipelines, developer experience

• Track record of cross-team impact: changing how multiple teams build, decide, or deliver

• Strong Python and dbt skills

• Demonstrated ability to frame ambiguous technical problems and drive them to resolution with minimal guidance

• Experience navigating organizational complexity and aligning stakeholders

• Experience making architectural decisions with long-term, multi-year consequences

• Strong technical judgment balanced with pragmatism: knows when to advocate for the right solution and when to move forward

Nice-to-haves:

• Knowledge of compliance and regulatory frameworks (ex: GDPR, CCPA, SOC2, FedRAMP) and how to translate them into platform controls

• Experience designing golden paths and self-service tooling for engineering teams

Our mission is to keep the physical world running. Factories, fleets, hospitals and campuses stay up because the people who maintain them have tools worth using. That is what we build.

Compensation and benefits.

• Base pay is one part of the package.
• Depending on the role, compensation may also include commission, an annual bonus and equity.
• Benefits differ by country.
• For roles in the United States, Autodesk’s benefits are described at benefits.autodesk.com.
• For roles in Canada and other countries, the plan differs on health coverage, retirement and leave, and your recruiter will walk you through it.

Belonging.

We take pride in a culture where everyone can thrive. More at autodesk.com/company/global-belonging. More on where this is going: Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost on building the future of connected operations, and AOS SVP Stephen Hooper on welcoming MaintainX to Autodesk.