Principal Storage Engineer Jobs in Raleigh, NC (NOW HIRING)

If you've spent years deep in the Lustre codebase not just administering Lustre systems, but actually designing, building, optimizing, and upstreaming features - this is a chance to work on one of the most demanding storage engineering problems in the market.

We're looking for a hands-on Lustre Engineer to help shape the next generation of high-performance, enterprise-ready Lustre capabilities. This role is for someone who is equally comfortable working in kernel-space C, analyzing performance bottlenecks in large-scale deployments, and collaborating with other senior engineers to evolve Lustre architecture for modern infrastructure.

What you'll do

• Contribute to Lustre architecture and lead implementation of new features across core subsystems including MDS/OSS, LDLM, DNE, DoM, FLD, layout, snapshot, quota, security, and recovery
• Write high-performance, production-grade code across the Lustre kernel module, user-space utilities, and supporting libraries
• Own the full development lifecycle for major features, from design and coding through testing, performance tuning, and upstream patch submission
• Improve scalability for multi-petabyte Lustre environments, including metadata performance, I/O path optimization, and integration with modern interconnects and storage fabrics
• Modernize Lustre internals through kernel API updates, locking improvements, RDMA enhancements, and cloud/container-oriented capabilities
• Prototype and evaluate emerging technologies such as NVMe-oF, CXL, and other next-generation storage approaches for potential Lustre integration
• Strengthen regression, stress, and performance validation using tools such as IOR, mdtest, fio, and custom Lustre test tooling
• Perform deep code-level performance analysis using Lustre tracing tools, perf, lockstat, and kernel profilers
• Work closely with Principal Engineers, hardware teams, and application owners to translate real workload needs into practical Lustre improvements
• Mentor other developers and contribute design docs, technical guides, and engineering reviews

What we're looking for

• 7+ years of progressive, hands-on Lustre software development experience
• A strong track record of meaningful contributions to the Lustre codebase in production or open-source environments
• Demonstrated success designing, implementing, and upstreaming Lustre features that made it into major releases
• Deep understanding of Lustre internals, including MDS/OSS architecture, LDLM locking and recovery, journaling, DNE, DoM, FLD, layout, quota, and security
• Expert-level C programming and strong Linux kernel development experience
• Strong knowledge of distributed systems, parallel file systems, and high-performance I/O
• Experience with Lustre build, development, and debugging tooling such as lctl, llstat, strace, perf, and kernel tracers
• Python and/or Bash skills for tooling and automation
• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related field
• Clear written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts effectively

Nice to have

• 7+ years in HPC or storage software development
• Visible contributions to the Lustre open-source community, including accepted patches, LUG participation, or public technical talks
• Experience running or developing Lustre in cloud environments such as AWS FSx for Lustre, Azure Lustre, or custom cloud deployments
• Familiarity with adjacent systems such as Ceph, DAOS, BeeGFS, WekaIO, or GPFS
• Exposure to RDMA, NVMe-oF, CXL, computational storage, or AI/ML I/O workloads
• Conference presentations, technical publications, or other public engineering contributions

You'll likely be a strong fit if you...

• Have built inside Lustre itself, not just around it
• Enjoy solving hard kernel, performance, and distributed systems problems
• Care about code quality, upstream contribution, and long-term architectural impact
• Want to work on infrastructure that operates at real scale under real performance constraints

This role is probably not the right fit if you...

• Have mainly supported or administered Lustre rather than developed it
• Come from general storage or kernel backgrounds without clear Lustre code contribution history
• Prefer high-level application engineering over low-level systems and kernel work

Salary Range: $150,000 - $250,000

Why this role is interesting

This is a rare opportunity to work on deeply technical, high-impact storage engineering problems in a domain where performance, scale, reliability, and upstream credibility all matter. If you want to influence the future of Lustre in production-grade environments, this is the kind of role where your work can genuinely shape the platform.

Call to action

If you've made meaningful contributions to Lustre and want to work on large-scale filesystem innovation, we'd love to hear from you.

#LinkedIn