Data Center Design Engineer

Cloudflare•San Francisco, CA

About The Position

Cloudflare is seeking a Data Center Design Engineer to design infrastructure deployments that improve cost, quality, and deployment speed. The engineer will lead electrical design and end-to-end delivery for new data center sites, expansions, and infrastructure upgrades supporting compute, storage, and high-density liquid-cooled GPU deployments. The role requires progressing multiple projects in parallel, coordinating with many stakeholders, and representing Cloudflare as the owner's technical representative in a high-growth environment. The position is part of Cloudflare’s global Infrastructure team, which grows and manages the company’s global data center and PoP footprint. The engineer will work with internal teams and external partners to qualify sites, establish design criteria, oversee construction and commissioning, and hand infrastructure over for operations. The role also covers power and cooling design, capacity tracking, technical reviews, and development of repeatable and modular construction strategies. Travel of up to 25% is required.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience and at least 5 years of experience in data center mechanical and electrical design and operations, deployment, or installation.
Experience with HVAC, chilled-water and condenser-water systems, pump controls, glycols, air-handling units, CRAC and CRAH systems, raised-floor systems, hot/cold aisle containment, and building management systems.
Understanding of basic electrical theory, circuit design and analysis, and single- and three-phase power systems.
Familiarity with data center mechanical and electrical infrastructure design, electrical and UPS topologies, and cooling methodologies, including central plants, room cooling, and high-density thermal strategies.
Familiarity with resilient data center design standards and Uptime Institute Tier classifications.
Excellent verbal, written communication, and presentation skills.
Experience working across multiple time zones and with cross-functional teams.
Experience delivering time-sensitive projects under pressure.
Understanding of network hardware architecture, data center switching and routing infrastructure, and optical line/transceiver power and thermal profiles.
Experience acting as an owner's technical representative, governing external delivery partners, reviewing third-party designs, resolving technical disputes, and documenting closure of noncompliance and project risks.
Expertise in medium- and low-voltage distribution, transformers, generators, UPS systems, switchgear, transfer systems, busway, grounding, protection, and rack-level power architectures for high-density deployments.
Understanding of direct-to-chip liquid cooling and the electrical dependencies of CDUs, pumps, controls, facility water systems, and heat-rejection equipment.
Experience with construction administration, equipment testing, energization planning, staged commissioning, integrated systems testing, deficiency management, and failure-mode testing.
Experience with utility coordination, design-deviation governance, power-quality or incident investigations, and lifecycle management of mission-critical electrical infrastructure.

Nice To Haves

Professional Engineer (P.E.) certification or equivalent.
Degree in electrical or mechanical engineering, or in IT.
Experience in large-scale mission-critical facility infrastructure design, construction, commissioning, or operations.
Experience with industry standards and building codes including NFPA 70/NEC, IEEE, NEMA, ANSI, UMC, ASHRAE, UBC, LEED, and Uptime Institute standards.
Knowledge of programming languages.
JIRA or Confluence administration-level experience.
AutoCAD experience.
Experience with FLOTHERM or Tileflow.
Hands-on experience with hardware validation, power/cooling capacity modeling, or thermal simulation tools such as FLOTHERM or Tileflow.
Familiarity with systems programming, scripting in Python, Go, or Bash, or automation workflows for power and infrastructure tracking.
Experience with NVIDIA DGX, GB200/GB300 NVL, OCP Open Rack, or comparable liquid-cooled GPU platforms and AI factory reference architectures.
Experience with ETAP, SKM PowerTools, EasyPower, or equivalent software for dynamic modeling, generator transient analysis, harmonic analysis, and UPS compatibility assessment.
Experience with EPMS/BMS integration, branch-circuit monitoring, rack-level telemetry, metering, capacity forecasting, or automated infrastructure reporting.

Responsibilities

Translate data center capacity requirements into white space designs and rack plans that account for individual data center contract constraints on power and cooling.
Manage implementation of cage projects with data center providers.
Design low-voltage structured cabling, fiber, cross-connect, conveyance, and supporting ceiling or floor infrastructure.
Work with supply chain on rack integration plans and location deployment qualification.
Coordinate with data center engineering, capacity planning, network strategy, security, and other internal teams to validate scope and solutions and create repeatable installation procedures.
Lead projects to design and implement data center expansions and new data centers on tight deadlines with minimal oversight.
Provide technical support during negotiations with external data center partners.
Assist with RFP preparation, review, and cost and engineering analysis.
Review one-line diagrams and cooling equations for new and existing data centers.
Review and approve power components, including PDUs, for the hardware sourcing team.
Implement, document, and maintain power-consumption tracking tools and fulfill ad hoc reporting requests.
Research power-efficiency technologies and programs.
Travel up to 25% to conduct infrastructure audits, validate construction work and buildouts, and participate in commercial processes.
Develop and execute modular and prefabricated data center construction strategies to accelerate deployment and optimize cost efficiency.
Perform electrical short-circuit, coordination, arc-flash, and load-flow engineering studies to support system reliability and compliance.
Partner with Hardware Sourcing and SRE/Infrastructure teams to validate PDU specifications, rack integration plans, and power-distribution topologies across global PoP footprints.
Lead electrical design and end-to-end execution for new sites, expansions, and upgrades from site qualification and basis of design through energization, commissioning, and operational handover.
Act as Cloudflare’s electrical owner's representative by defining design criteria, scopes, deliverables, responsibility matrices, review gates, and acceptance requirements for operators, engineers, contractors, commissioning agents, utilities, and vendors.
Design and review utility-to-rack infrastructure, including utility service, transformers, switchgear, generators, UPS and transfer systems, modular electrical assemblies, busway, feeders, whips, rack PDUs, grounding, and metering.
Define electrical interfaces and auxiliary-load requirements for direct-to-chip liquid cooling, CDUs, pumps, controls, leak detection, facility water systems, and heat-rejection equipment.
Develop and review basis-of-design documents, single-line diagrams, specifications, equipment schedules, calculations, sequences of operation, and interface control documents.
Oversee technical acceptance of factory and site acceptance testing, staged commissioning, integrated systems testing, failure-mode testing, deficiency closure, and turnover documentation.
Define EPMS, metering, telemetry, and capacity-tracking requirements for operational power and capacity management.