Senior Software Engineer, Data Engineering

Cisco; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 168,000 - 245,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco Network Platform is seeking a Data Engineer to build and operate large-scale data ingestion, processing, and storage systems that turn telemetry into reliable data products. You will work on petabyte-scale telemetry from millions of devices and help drive global operational insights.

You will partner with product and engineering teams in Kubernetes environments, implement robust observability with ELK and Grafana, and ensure security and design excellence across deployments.

Qualifications

• Experience building, operating, or debugging distributed systems or backend services that process at least 1TB of telemetry data daily.
• Programming experience using Scala, C++, or Java within a production environment.
• Experience designing and managing data pipelines applying streaming or batch processing frameworks such as Kafka, Spark, or Flink.
• Experience deploying and maintaining containerized workloads on Kubernetes clusters in a production environment.
• Experience with Terraform, Ansible, Elasticsearch, or Grafana for automating infrastructure and monitoring workflows.

Responsibilities

• Architect and operate scalable data pipelines capable of ingesting petabyte-scale telemetry from over 25 million network devices to drive global operational insights.
• Engineer resilient, high-performance distributed systems within Kubernetes environments.
• Collaborate across product and engineering teams to translate complex data requirements into dependable solutions.
• Establish robust observability standards using ELK and Grafana to proactively identify issues and streamline system recovery.
• Accelerate the development lifecycle by integrating AI-assisted engineering tools, ensuring security and design excellence.

Skills

Distributed systems

Scala

C++

Java

Kafka

Spark

Flink

Kubernetes

Terraform

Ansible

Elasticsearch

Grafana

Tools

Kubernetes

Job description

The application window is expected to close on: 10/26/2026

Meet the Team

Cisco Network Platform processes telemetry from more than 25 million devices worldwide, ingesting petabytes of data every day. This data powers critical network experiences, operational insights, and customer-facing capabilities across Cisco’s platform.

We’re looking for a Data Engineer to help build and operate the large-scale systems that make this possible. You’ll work on high-throughput data ingestion, processing, and storage systems that turn raw device telemetry into reliable, useful data products. This is an opportunity to solve distributed-systems challenges at meaningful scale alongside engineers across the organization.

Your Impact

In this role, you will architect and operate scalable data pipelines capable of ingesting petabyte-scale telemetry from over 25 million network devices to drive global operational insights. You will engineer resilient, high-performance distributed systems within Kubernetes environments, directly impacting the availability and reliability of critical network infrastructure. By collaborating across product and engineering teams, you will translate complex data requirements into dependable solutions that empower data-driven decision-making. You will establish robust observability standards using ELK and Grafana to proactively identify issues and streamline system recovery. You will accelerate the entire development lifecycle by integrating AI-assisted engineering tools, ensuring that every deployment meets rigorous standards for security, validation, and design excellence.

Minimum Qualifications

• Experience building, operating, or debugging distributed systems or backend services that process at least 1TB of telemetry data daily.
• Programming experience using Scala, C++, or Java within a production environment.
• Experience designing and managing data pipelines applying streaming or batch processing frameworks such as Kafka, Spark, or Flink.
• Experience deploying and maintaining containerized workloads on Kubernetes clusters in a production environment.
• Experience with Terraform, Ansible, Elasticsearch, or Grafana for automating infrastructure and monitoring workflows.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with real-time streaming or compute technologies such as Kafka, Flink, Spark, or similar platforms.
• Familiarity with network telemetry, networking protocols, or large fleet-management systems.
• Experience with SQL, distributed data stores or operating cloud-native services in production.
• Contributions to open-source projects, personal systems projects, or other evidence of technical curiosity.
• A pragmatic, organized approach to software quality, testing, and operational ownership, with strong problem-solving skills and enthusiasm for working with complex systems at scale.

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 each 1% of attainment between 50% and 75%;
• 1% of incentive target for each 1% of attainment between 75% and 100%; and
• Once performance exceeds 100% attainment, incentive rates are at or above 1% for each 1% of attainment with no cap on incentive compensation.

For non-quota-based sales performance elements such as strategic sales objectives, Cisco may pay 0% up to 125% of target. Cisco sales plans do not have a minimum threshold of performance for sales incentive compensation to be paid.

The applicable full salary ranges for this position, by specific state, are listed below:

New York City Metro Area

$167,700.00 - $282,000.00

Non-Metro New York State & Washington State

$149,100.00 - $250,900.00

• For quota-based sales roles on Cisco’s sales plan, the ranges provided in this posting include base pay and sales target incentive compensation combined.
• Employees in Illinois, whether exempt or non-exempt, will participate in a unique time off program to meet local requirements.