Senior Software Dev Engineer, EC2 Hyperplane

Come grow and lead a team building the next-generation software defined networks for AWS networking services.

Hyperplane is looking for a Software Development Engineer for a critical part of its service that delivers a distributed Network Function Virtualization (NFV) platform. This team owns distributed state and health tracking systems used for both customer-facing services such as NAT Gateway, Elastic File System, Load Balancers, AWS service endpoints as well as many internal AWS services. The successful candidate will be comfortable dealing with ambiguity, be very customer-centric and able to think big!

The ideal candidate will be passionate about the potential of cloud computing as well as about building resilient, scalable and high-performance distributed services. This strong engineer has thrived and succeeded in delivering high quality technology products/services in a rapid growth environment exhibiting abilities to prioritize well, communicate clearly and understand how to drive a high level of focus and excellence with a strong team. They are a seasoned, mature engineer who is comfortable working in a fast-paced team. We operate at very large scale and on critical workloads, so a passion and discipline around operational excellence is key. A high level of ownership and accountability is a must.

AWS Infrastructure Services owns the design, planning, delivery, and operation of all AWS global infrastructure. In other words, we're the people who keep the cloud running. We support all AWS data centers and all the servers, storage, networking, power, and cooling equipment that ensure our customers have continual access to the innovation they rely on. We work on the most challenging problems, with thousands of variables impacting the supply chain - and we're looking for talented people who want to help.

You'll join a diverse team of software, hardware, and network engineers, supply chain specialists, security experts, operations managers, and other vital roles. You'll collaborate with people across AWS to help us deliver the highest standards for safety and security while providing seemingly infinite capacity at the lowest possible cost for our customers. And you'll experience an inclusive culture that welcomes bold ideas and empowers you to own them to completion.

A successful candidate is comfortable in a leadership role and seeks to mentor and grow less experienced engineers on the team. You understand customer obsession and live and breathe operational excellence. You know when to partner with and influence other teams to deliver results. You will emphasize hiring and developing the best talent at AWS. This particular role will "float" across three two-pizza teams specializing in the connection tracking abilities of this networking platform. This is a critical role that dives deep into the intricacies of how a large-scale, distributed, software-defined network reliably tracks and load balances TCP flows.

Ready to make a durable mark on the computer industry? Come join us for this unique opportunity that blends leadership, technology, and accelerating customer growth!

Key job responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain highly scalable distributed systems that power AWS EC2"s network virtualization infrastructure, ensuring low-latency and high-throughput performance for millions of customer workloads
• Lead technical design and architecture decisions for critical components of the Hyperplane platform, including packet processing, network policy enforcement, and traffic management systems
• Mentor junior engineers through code reviews, design discussions, and technical guidance, raising the engineering bar across the team
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams including network engineering, security, and product management to deliver customer-facing features and improvements
• Optimize system performance through profiling, benchmarking, and implementing improvements to meet stringent latency and throughput requirements
• Participate in on-call rotations, troubleshoot complex production issues, and drive operational excellence initiatives to improve system reliability and availability
• Contribute to long-term technical strategy and roadmap planning, identifying opportunities for innovation and architectural improvements
• Write high-quality, maintainable code in languages such as C++, Rust, or Java, following best practices for testing, documentation, and deployment

A day in the life

You might start your morning reviewing a design proposal for the new greenfield system, providing feedback that shapes the architecture before code is written. After a stand-up with your team, you spend focused time writing or reviewing code for a distributed state-tracking component. In the afternoon, you pair with a teammate to debug a tricky concurrency issue, then join a cross-team sync to align on an upcoming integration. Throughout the day, you balance hands-on technical work with coaching conversations that help the team grow.

About the team

The Hyperplane team builds and operates the foundational network virtualization platform that powers Amazon EC2. Our systems process trillions of packets daily, providing secure network isolation, policy enforcement, and traffic management for millions of customer instances across AWS regions. We are in a period of deliberate investment - rebuilding our team with experienced technical leaders, expanding into generative AI, and planning a greenfield rewrite of a critical system. It is a rare opportunity to join at a moment when you can directly influence the team"s culture, technical direction, and long-term roadmap.