Sr. Site Reliability Engineer - Top Secret Clearance (Application Software, Data)

Position Overview

SpaceX was founded under the belief that a future where humanity is out exploring the stars is fundamentally more exciting than one where we are not. As a Position: SR. SITE RELIABILITY ENGINEER, DATA - TOP SECRET CLEARANCE (APPLICATION SOFTWARE, DATA), you will join the application software team—the central nervous system of SpaceX. You will design and build mission-critical applications that accelerate launch vehicle production and flight while also supporting Starlink’s global high-speed internet service. This role requires a passion for problem solving, collaborative work with engineers across all programs, and a drive to support SpaceX’s ambitious goals.

Key Responsibilities

• Upgrade existing distributed systems to become sharded and geo-redundant in multiple data centers.
• Advance deployment, monitoring, and alerting infrastructures to support a multi-region environment.
• Manage petabyte scale bare metal compute clusters.
• Collaborate closely with engineers across all programs to create highly operable, scalable, and maintainable products.
• Engage throughout the entire software development lifecycle—from inception and design to deployment, operation, and iterative refinement.
• Focus on addressing performance bottlenecks and implementing performance improvement techniques.

Required Qualifications

• Education: Bachelor's degree in computer science, engineering, math, or a scientific discipline and 5 years of software development experience; OR 7+ years of professional experience building software with site reliability or DevOps in lieu of a degree.
• Experience with Linux operating systems.
• Requirements: Active Top Secret or TS/SCI clearance. Must be willing to work extended hours and weekends when needed.

Preferred Qualifications

• 5+ years of rigorous experience with site reliability or DevOps.
• Experience with Kubernetes and Istio for on-premise deployment.
• Experience with in-stream data processing and analytics using open source platforms such as Apache Kafka, Spark, HBase, HDFS, or Flink.
• Experience troubleshooting hardware and network-layer issues.
• Programming experience in Python, C#, Java, Scala, Go, or similar languages.
• Good understanding of version control, testing, continuous integration, build, deployment, and monitoring.

Benefits & Perks

• Compensation: Software Engineer/Senior base salary ranging from $160,000.00 to $220,000.00 per year, with actual salary determined on a case-by-case basis. Active clearance may result in a differential of up to 10% (up to an additional $15,000 annually).
• Benefits: Eligibility for long-term incentives including company stock, stock options, or long-term cash awards; potential discretionary bonuses; comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage; 401(k) retirement plan; short & long-term disability insurance; life insurance; paid parental leave; paid vacation and holidays; and additional perks such as an Employee Stock Purchase Plan.