Principal Engineer, Query Processing

With Confluent, organizations can harness the full power of continuously flowing data to innovate and win in the modern digital world. We have a purpose that drives us to do better every day – we're creating an entirely new category within data infrastructure - data streaming. This technology will allow every organization to create experiences and use the power of data in ways that profoundly impact the way we all live. This impact is our purpose and drives us to do better every day.

One Confluent. One team. One Data Streaming Platform.

Data Connects Us.

About the Role:

We are looking for a visionary Principal Engineer to lead the architectural strategy and technical execution of Confluent's query processing initiatives. As a key leader within the Analytics organization, you will drive the development and innovation of low latency and high throughput query capabilities, empowering our customers to derive actionable insights and make data-driven decisions at scale.

What You Will Do:

• Leadership and Strategy: Provide technical visionary leadership and strategic direction for query processing, aligning with Confluent’s overall business objectives.
• Technical Execution: Champion engineering best practices, architectural design, and technical decision-making within the Analytics organization. Lead the design and development of a performant and highly scalable query engine leveraging Confluent’s streaming platform to deliver low-latency actionable insights.
• Cross-functional Collaboration: Partner closely with Product Management, Design, and other engineering teams to define and execute product roadmaps.
• Operational Excellence: Establish and monitor key metrics and performance indicators to ensure operational efficiency and delivery excellence.
• Customer Focus: Collaborate with Product and Customer Success teams to understand customer needs and feedback, incorporating insights into technical long-term roadmaps

What You Will Bring:

• Technical Expertise: 10+ years of hands-on software engineering experience in distributed databases. Proven track record of leading engineers across teams designing, developing, and operating large-scale and performant OLAP-style systems.
• Database and Query Execution Expertise: In-depth knowledge of database internals, including query compilation and optimization, execution, vectorized runtimes, distributed shuffles, columnar storage, etc.
• Query Performance and Cost Optimization: Proven experience optimizing query performance (latency, concurrency, and throughput) and cost efficiency in OLAP engines.
• Large-Scale Cloud Operations: Extensive experience operating and scaling OLAP engines or data warehouses in cloud environments, using cloud-native technologies to ensure reliability, scalability, and cost-effectiveness.
• Open-Source Contributions: Active participation in leading open-source projects such as Apache Flink, Calcite, DataFusion, Celeborn, Arrow, Spark, Clickhouse, Velox, and Ray, etc., showcasing technical leadership and advancing the state-of-the-art in distributed query processing.
• Strategic Thinker: Ability to formulate and execute strategic initiatives with a deep understanding of the industry's technical trends and the pros and cons of query engine systems.
• Collaborative Mindset: Experience working cross-functionally in a dynamic, fast-paced environment, driving alignment and achieving shared goals.
• Communication Skills: Excellent verbal and written communication skills, articulating technical concepts and strategies to technical and non-technical stakeholders

Come As You Are

At Confluent, equality is a core tenet of our culture. We are committed to building an inclusive global team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, beliefs, and experiences. The more diverse we are, the richer our community and the broader our impact. Employment decisions are made on the basis of job-related criteria without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other classification protected by applicable law.

At Confluent, we are committed to providing competitive pay and benefits that are in line with industry standards. We analyze and carefully consider several factors when determining compensation, including work history, education, professional experience, and location. This position has an annual estimated salary of $279,000 - $334,800 and a competitive equity package. The actual pay may vary depending on your skills, qualifications, experience, and work location. In addition, Confluent offers a wide range of employee benefits. To learn more about our benefits click HERE.

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