Sr. System Development Engineer, Solid State Drives Team

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 of 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.

The AWS Hardware Engineering (HWEng) team creates server designs for Amazon’s innovative web services. Our designs are industry-leading in frugality and operational excellence, and are critical to the success of the AWS business and the more than one million customers who use AWS today. Our engineers solve challenging technology problems, and build architecturally sound, high-quality components to enable AWS to realize critical business strategies.

The ideal candidate for this role is knowledgeable of the full technical stack, from hardware up to the software. You have tremendous interest in cloud scale and curious how systems and software decisions impact users. You insist on the highest-standards and are able to develop tactical solutions/tools to diagnose and fix issues. You are an excellent systems debugger - finding interaction issues between components on server systems. You are a leader with strong organizational, planning, and communication skills. You are a builder!

What will you do?
You will be a member of the larger HWEng Storage organization and will lead ideation, design and implementation of new automation capabilities in the Solid-State Drive (SSD) team. These components are used by all of AWS server platform teams, e.g. AI/ML servers, storage servers, compute servers, etc. Given the sheer number of programs that this team supports and the scale at which Amazon operates, you will be expected to pitch new automation initiatives, optimize existing ones, and lead the SysDE community to eliminate tactical and redundant manual efforts.

You will work with engineers across the company for delivering the next-generation AWS Storage platforms. You will have a direct impact on our bottom line and the ability to deliver improvements for AWS. You will be part of a growing, fast paced, and fun team. You will have ownership for the implementation of your work. You will see direct product improvements based on the results of your work.

AWS Engineers are shaping the way people use computers and designing the future of cloud computing technology – come help us make history!

Why it matters: Public cloud IT services represent the majority of growth in the overall IT services market and will continue to do so for several years to come. The scale of AWS, combined with an understanding of how our hardware is used, creates a unique opportunity for component customization that will directly benefit customers.

Why you will love it: You will work with engineers across the company to build next-generation storage servers. You will have a direct impact on our bottom line and the ability to deliver improvements for our developers. You will be part of a growing, fast paced, and fun team. You will have ownership for the implementation of your work. You will see direct product improvements based on the results of your work.


Key job responsibilities
You will be a member of the Solid-State Drives (SSDs) team, responsible for delivering high quality SSDs that seamlessly integrate into your customers’ products on a timely fashion and consistently enhance the quality and performance of customers’ products, fostering long-term partnerships. You will lead and develop automation with the end goal of improving SSD components’ quality used in NPI servers (New Product Introductions) and sustaining fleet servers. Key Responsibilities for this position include leading and implementing software (SW) best practices, author requirement documents for new architecture, publish comprehensive design docs along with trade-offs, SW development, testing and building diagnostic tools for continuous monitoring. A successful candidate in this role has prior hands-on SSD debugging experience on Linux systems and familiarity with kernel drivers and OS level software. Given our scale, it is critical to design tools, tests, infra that are future proof, scale and are stable. A SysDE in this position ideally has an understanding of server design and architecture to improve security, telemetry and debugging of hosts in production across ARM and x86. A successful candidate also has a growth mindset, learns fast, deep dives to solve variety of issues, and acts quickly to bring timely resolution to customers.

About the team
Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the world’s most comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud platform. We pioneered cloud computing and never stopped innovating — that’s why customers from the most successful startups to Global 500 companies trust our robust suite of products and services to power their businesses.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) values diverse experiences. Even if you do not meet all of the preferred qualifications and skills listed in the job description, we encourage candidates to apply. If your career is just starting, hasn’t followed a traditional path, or includes alternative experiences, don’t let it stop you from applying.

We value work-life harmony. Achieving success at work should never come at the expense of sacrifices at home, which is why we strive for flexibility as part of our working culture. When we feel supported in the workplace and at home, there’s nothing we can’t achieve in the cloud.

Here at AWS, it’s in our nature to learn and be curious. Our employee-led affinity groups foster a culture of inclusion that empower us to be proud of our differences. Ongoing events and learning experiences, including our Conversations on Race and Ethnicity (CORE) and AmazeCon (diversity) conferences, inspire us to never stop embracing our uniqueness.

We’re continuously raising our performance bar as we strive to become Earth’s Best Employer. That’s why you’ll find endless knowledge-sharing, mentorship and other career-advancing resources here to help you develop into a better-rounded professional.
- 3+ years of programming with at least one modern language such as C++, C#, Java, Python, Golang, PowerShell, Ruby experience
- 4+ years of non-internship professional software development experience
- 2+ years of designing or architecting (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
- 4+ years of deploying and operating in a Linux/Unix environment experience
- 2+ years of systems design, software development, operations, automation, and process improvement experience
- Experience leading the design, build and deployment of complex and performant (reliable and scalable) software solutions in production
- 7+ years of administrative experience in networking, storage systems, operating systems and hands-on systems engineering experience
- Experience programming with at least one modern language such as C++, C#, Java, Python, Golang, PowerShell, Ruby- Experience working in an Agile environment using the Scrum methodology
- Experience with modern technology devices in storage, network, memory as well as a variety of interface standards and protocols (I2C, IPMI, SPI, PCIe, SATA, SAS, NVMe)
- Strong understanding of drive (SSD and/or HDD) technologies
- Strong understanding of storage subsystems in a Linux-based environment and kernel drivers.
- 5+ years or more in software development, systems development, SRE (Site Reliability Engineering), or Resilience Engineering
- 5+ years of server systems debug experience; debugging and root causing complex server platforms
- 5+ years of experience building software automation systems to increase durability, security, availability and scalability of Linux based storage systems
- Experience with validation of hardware, software and implementing test plans.
- Strong Linux knowledge
- Experience with x86 architecture, as well as ARM, and GPU/ FPGA devices
- Strong coding skills with focus on reliability, scale and diagnostics (including developing tactical and strategic tools using Python, Go, C/C++ or any other suitable high level language).
- Experience with server validation, testing, issue root causing and coverage analysis.
- Able to work in a diverse team
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills and ability to collaborate
- Meets/exceeds Amazon’s leadership principles requirements for this role
- Meets/exceeds Amazon’s functional/technical depth and complexity for this role

Amazon is committed to a diverse and inclusive workplace. Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, protected veteran status, disability, age, or other legally protected status.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

Our compensation reflects the cost of labor across several US geographic markets. The base pay for this position ranges from $136,100/year in our lowest geographic market up to $235,200/year in our highest geographic market. Pay is based on a number of factors including market location and may vary depending on job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Amazon is a total compensation company. Dependent on the position offered, equity, sign-on payments, and other forms of compensation may be provided as part of a total compensation package, in addition to a full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits. For more information, please visit https://www.aboutamazon.com/workplace/employee-benefits. This position will remain posted until filled. Applicants should apply via our internal or external career site.