Senior/Staff Software Engineer - Ml/Ai Applications

Zoox; California (MO); On-site; USD 215,000 - 294,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

paid time off

unpaid time off

Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights

Amazon RSUs

health insurance

long-term care insurance

long-term and short-term disability

life insurance

Job summary

Zoox is seeking a Technical Lead to own end-to-end integration of a tool-centric agent runtime with external and internal clients, line-of-business backends, and cloud operations (Kubernetes, observability, secrets management).

You will translate architecture and security intent into stable tool contracts, testable milestones, and repeatable releases, and you will be the primary engineer at the boundary between product surfaces and upstream systems.

Qualifications

• BS or MS in Computer Science or a related field with 7+ years of software engineering experience, strong in integration, platform, or backend roles.
• Strong Python (production services, async I/O, automated testing) and comfort in a large monorepo with CI-driven delivery.
• Deep experience with HTTP integration (REST/JSON-RPC, TLS, debugging under load) and shipping services on Kubernetes (deployments, health checks, troubleshooting).
• Auth integration experience: bearer tokens, JWT validation, OAuth2/OIDC or enterprise SSO concepts, and least-privilege scoping

Responsibilities

• Own and lead integration strategy and execution across hosted services, shared libraries, standardized tool protocols (e.g., JSON-RPC over HTTP), REST APIs, and diverse callers (vendor agents, consoles, automation workers).
• Drive cross-functional delivery with backend API teams, partner agent owners, security, SRE/platform, and program management, ensuring formal sign-off where required.
• Debug and root-cause complex failures using structured logs, distributed traces, metrics, and gateway/session-token behavior, documenting durable mitigations and runbooks.
• Define and review all integration artifacts (contracts, allowlists, registry config, environment matrices, and interface assumptions) that upstream and downstream teams implement against.
• Contribute to release gating by ensuring container image promotion, configuration/secrets posture, smoke path execution for high-traffic flows, and disciplined branching/tagging for production intent

Skills

Python

CI/CD

Distributed systems

Education

BS or MS in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Kubernetes

REST/JSON-RPC

TLS / OAuth2 / JWT

Job description

As a Technical Lead on Zoox's internal agentic platform, you will own end-to-end integration of a tool-centric agent runtime with external and internal agent clients, line of business backends, scheduled and interactive agent workloads, and cloud operations (Kubernetes, observability, secrets management). You will translate architecture and security intent into stable tool contracts, testable integration milestones, and repeatable releases, and you will be the primary engineer when issues sit at the boundary between product surfaces, platform services, and upstream systems.

This role is platform and service integration for an agentic framework that mediates tools (discovery, invocation, policy, and telemetry). Success is measured by reliable tool call paths over HTTP, correct authentication and scoping, environment parity from dev through production, and clear ownership across partner engineering, security, and infrastructure teams.

In this role, you will:

• Own and lead integration strategy and execution across hosted services, shared libraries, standardized tool protocols (e.g., JSON-RPC over HTTP), REST APIs, and diverse callers (vendor agents, consoles, automation workers).
• Drive cross-functional delivery with backend API teams, partner agent owners, security, SRE/platform, and program management, ensuring formal sign-off where required.
• Debug and root-cause complex failures using structured logs, distributed traces, metrics, and gateway/session-token behavior, documenting durable mitigations and runbooks.
• Define and review all integration artifacts (contracts, allowlists, registry config, environment matrices, and interface assumptions) that upstream and downstream teams implement against.
• Contribute to release gating by ensuring container image promotion, configuration/secrets posture, smoke path execution for high-traffic flows, and disciplined branching/tagging for production intent

Qualifications:

• BS or MS in Computer Science or a related field with 7+ years of software engineering experience, strong in integration, platform, or backend roles.
• Strong Python (production services, async I/O, automated testing) and comfort in a large monorepo with CI-driven delivery.
• Deep experience with HTTP integration (REST/JSON-RPC, TLS, debugging under load) and shipping services on Kubernetes (deployments, health checks, troubleshooting).
• Auth integration experience: bearer tokens, JWT validation, OAuth2/OIDC or enterprise SSO concepts, and least-privilege scoping

Bonus Qualifications

• Exposure to Model Context Protocol (MCP) or similar agent tool-calling and orchestration models used in industry or internal platforms.
• Observability-led integration habits: metrics, traces, structured logging, and basic SLO or dashboard thinking for integration health.
• Background in security-sensitive integrations (data minimization, external partner access, review cycles with security or compliance).

$215,000 - $294,000 a year

Base Salary Range

There are three major components to compensation for this position: salary, Amazon Restricted Stock Units (RSUs), and Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights. A sign-on bonus may be offered as part of the compensation package. The listed range applies only to the base salary. Compensation will vary based on geographic location and level. Leveling, as well as positioning within a level, is determined by a range of factors, including, but not limited to, a candidate's relevant years of experience, domain knowledge, and interview performance. The salary range listed in this posting is representative of the range of levels Zoox is considering for this position.

Zoox also offers a comprehensive package of benefits, including

• paid time off (e.g. sick leave, vacation, bereavement)
• unpaid time off
• Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights
• Amazon RSUs
• health insurance
• long-term care insurance
• long-term and short-term disability insurance
• life insurance

About Zoox

Zoox is developing the first ground-up, fully autonomous vehicle fleet and the supporting ecosystem required to bring this technology to market. Sitting at the intersection of robotics, machine learning, and design, Zoox aims to provide the next generation of mobility-as-a-service in urban environments. We’re looking for top talent that shares our passion and wants to be part of a fast-moving and highly execution-oriented team.

Follow us on LinkedIn

Accommodations

If you need an accommodation to participate in the application or interview process please reach out to [e-mail] or your assigned recruiter.

A Final Note:

You do not need to match every listed expectation to apply for this position. Here at Zoox, we know that diverse perspectives foster the innovation we need to be successful, and we are committed to building a team that encompasses a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and skills.