Senior Software Engineer

Kong; United States; Remote; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Kong is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to build high-performance Go runtime and CLI engines. You will architect state management drift detection and SDK tooling used across Kong’s runtimes, including REST/gRPC/OpenAPI contracts and automated spec-driven tooling for SDKs and IaC definitions.

You will balance software development with APIOps, focusing on scalable, multi-tenant API topologies, and contribute to Terraform provider ecosystems and next-gen runtimes.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of software engineering experience designing and delivering production-grade backend systems and developer tools using Golang.
• API Design mastery with REST, gRPC, OpenAPI focusing on backwards compatibility and DX.
• Hands-on IaC / Platform understanding with Terraform provider development, Kubernetes operators or stateful CI/CD automation pipelines.

Responsibilities

• Own declarative Engine State Drift Management Engines: design and optimize Go algorithms for state diffing and real-time drift detection.
• Architect enterprise-grade Go SDKs used by internal microservices and external clients to interface with the Konnect SaaS platform.
• Define clean, extensible API contracts and architect tooling to generate SDKs, client libraries and IaC definitions.

Skills

Golang

APIOps

CLI tooling

CI/CD

Tools

Terraform Provider

Kubernetes Operators

OpenAPI tooling

Job description

Are you ready to unlock intelligence? If you don’t think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

Kong’s API Management suite includes the Kong Enterprise Gateway, the Konnect SaaS platform and a variety of Managed Gateways in public clouds like AWS, Azure and GCP. This suite of products helps customers in different industries (like finance, banking, eCommerce, airlines, etc.) manage their API platforms and operations at scale. Our customers expect secure, reliable, high scale, low latency offerings from Kong whether running on-premise or in the public cloud.

About the Role:

As a Senior Software Engineer, you will develop high-performance Go runtime, CLI engines and declarative state managers. You will architect the software that thousands of engineering teams use every day to interact with Kong's runtime — including deck (Kong’s state management drift detection engine), the Kong Terraform Provider, official Go SDKs and automated spec-driven API tooling.

What You Will Build Own:

You will balance Software Development with APIOps Architecture:1. Declarative EngineState Drift Management Engines: Design and optimize algorithms in Go for state diffing, validation, and real-time drift detection across large-scale multi-tenant API topologies.Go SDK Core Libraries: Architect and maintain enterprise-grade, high-performance Go SDKs used by Kong’s internal microservices and external clients to interface with the Konnect SaaS platform.API Design Standardization: Define clean, extensible REST API contracts across Kong’s platform runtimes.Code Generation Tooling Pipelines: Architect spec-driven tooling (OpenAPI/AsyncAPI) to dynamically generate SDKs, client libraries, and IaC definitions without manual developer toil.2. APIOps IaC EcosystemCore CLI Engineering: Build modern, fast, and intuitive CLI-first developer experiences designed for both human developer workflows and high-concurrency CI/CD automation pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins).Terraform Provider Ecosystem: Build and extend high-reliability Terraform Providers to enable seamless IaC operations.Support for Next-Gen Runtimes: Bring new runtime capabilities into the declarative management ecosystem as native API primitives.

What You’ll Bring:

5+ years of software engineering experience designing and delivering production-grade backend systems and developer tools using Golang.API Design Mastery: Proven experience crafting intuitive, developer-friendly API schemas (REST, gRPC, OpenAPI), with an strong focus on backwards compatibility, versioning and developer experience (DX).Hands-on IaC / Platform Understanding: Production exposure to Terraform provider development, Kubernetes operators or stateful CI/CD automation pipelines.Engineering Rigor: Strong commitment to clean code, comprehensive