Network Platform Engineer (Senior)

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory • Berkeley, CA

9h • Hybrid

About The Position

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) is seeking a Network Platform Engineer (Senior). Join us in accelerating scientific discovery for the DOE Office of Science by advancing data movement, computation, and evolving data management workflows. As a Network Platform Engineer (Senior), you will bring your skills in automation, software development and AI-driven networking to shape our High-Performance Computing (HPC) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) network technology, improving performance and driving optimization of our HPC and Data Center infrastructure. Our group manages the 1 Tb/s border bandwidth to ESnet and an 800G/400G data center network backbone which support the NERSC-9 & NERSC-10 supercomputers, multi-tier storage, archive and edge services. We enable real-time scientific computation for our >10,000 users and your expertise will contribute to our efforts in enhancing performance, scalability, automation, and reliability of scientific workflows. We’re here for the same mission, to bring science solutions to the world. We welcome candidates from all backgrounds, including those with non-traditional paths. We value a growth mindset and believe skills and experience are transferable. If you’re eager to learn and meet the minimum qualifications below, we encourage you to apply. Join our team where your work can have a high impact for an organization associated with 17 Nobel Prizes… and counting.

Requirements

• Typically requires a minimum of 8 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree; or 6 years and a Master’s degree; or equivalent experience.
• 5+ years of IP networking experience in Data Center or LAN environments.
• 2+ years of network automation and optimization experience.
• Project management experience in developing technical project scope, schedule and budget.
• Strong written, verbal, listening, and presentation skills; effective collaboration skills with technical peers, vendors, and customers.
• Ability to resolve complex issues in creative and effective ways.
• Ability to network and collaborate with key contacts outside their own area of expertise.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively as part of a cross-disciplinary team.
• Typically requires a minimum of 12 years of related experience with a Bachelor’s degree; or 8 years and a Master’s degree; or equivalent experience.
• 10+ years of IP networking experience in Data Center or LAN environments.
• 4+ years of network automation and optimization experience.
• Demonstrated project management expertise, specifically, in leading the development of technical project scope, schedule and budget.
• Excellent written, verbal, listening, and presentation skills; excellent communication and collaboration skills with technical peers, vendors, and customers.

Nice To Haves

• Expert-level capabilities in configuring, troubleshooting, and using IPv4/IPv6 routing protocols, preferably BGP, VXLAN, L3VPN, OSPF, and/or ISIS in a WAN or LAN environment.
• Strong software development skills in Python or Go and experience with network automation tools (Ansible, Terraform, eAPI, etc.).
• Demonstrated experience with AI-driven networking, intent-based networking, or ML-based network optimization.
• Demonstrated experience in leading network technology migrations or upgrades in high-performance computing environments.
• Demonstrated experience in automating the network’s daily operational, deployment and monitoring tasks.
• Demonstrated experience with RDMA (Remote Direct Memory Access), Infiniband, HPC Protocol, RoCE (RDMA over Converged Ethernet).
• Demonstrated experience working with Network Management platforms like Arista CloudVision, Nvidia UFM, Dell SFM.
• Demonstrated experience in designing and implementing network security architectures, including segmentation (e.g., VRFs, micro-segmentation), access control (ACLs), encryption (IPsec/MACsec), and threat detection/mitigation in large-scale enterprise or HPC environments.
• Demonstrated experience in hybrid cloud networking, including connectivity models (VPN, Direct Connect/ExpressRoute), multi-cloud architectures, and integrating on-prem HPC or data center networks with public cloud environments.

Responsibilities

• Manage software, automation, and observability solutions for network provisioning, configuration, monitoring, and troubleshooting in HPC and Data Center environments.
• Contribute to Data Center modernization efforts and NERSC’s Smart Facility initiative
• Support efforts to design and deliver network services to address emerging needs (e.g., American Science Cloud, new Edge services).
• Continuously monitor and optimize network performance, focusing on reducing latency, maximizing throughput, and improving fault tolerance.
• Create and maintain comprehensive network documentation, including physical & logical topological diagrams.
• Collaborate with the Security Group to implement security measures for data integrity and privacy, ensuring high availability and reliability through redundancy and failover mechanisms.
• Share on-call rotation with colleagues and serve as an escalation contact for service incidents.
• Work on and resolve complex issues where analysis of situations or data requires an in-depth evaluation of multiple variables.
• Exercise judgment in selecting methods, techniques and evaluation criteria for obtaining results.
• Network with key contacts outside your own area of expertise.
• Develop software, automation, and observability solutions for network provisioning, configuration, monitoring, and troubleshooting in HPC and Data Center environments.
• Lead Data Center modernization efforts in support of NERSC’s Smart Facility initiative and emerging needs e.g., American ScienceCloud
• Design, develop, and maintain automation frameworks, infrastructure-as-code, and software solutions to manage, optimize, and self-heal the HPC and data center network.
• Build and integrate AI/ML-driven observability, predictive analytics, and automated remediation capabilities into network operations.
• Work on and resolve significant and/or unique issues where analysis of situations or data requires an evaluation of intangibles.
• Determine methods and procedures on new assignments and may coordinate activities of other personnel.
• Exercise independent judgment in methods, techniques and evaluation criteria for obtaining results.

Benefits

• Exceptional health and retirement benefits, including pension or 401K-style plans
• Opportunities to grow in your career - check out our Tuition Assistance Program
• A culture where you’ll belong - we are invested in our teams!
• In addition to accruing vacation and sick time, we also have a Winter Holiday Shutdown every year.
• Parental bonding leave (for both mothers and fathers)
• Pet insurance

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Number of Employees: 11-50 employees