Senior Principal Software Applications Engineer

Marvell Technology•Santa Clara, CA

About The Position

About Marvell Marvell’s semiconductor solutions are the essential building blocks of the data infrastructure that connects our world. Across enterprise, cloud and AI, and carrier architectures, our innovative technology is enabling new possibilities. At Marvell, you can affect the arc of individual lives, lift the trajectory of entire industries, and fuel the transformative potential of tomorrow. For those looking to make their mark on purposeful and enduring innovation, above and beyond fleeting trends, Marvell is a place to thrive, learn, and lead. Your Team, Your Impact Marvell’s U.S. Customer Solutions Group is the frontline interface for our most strategic customers—hyperscale data centers, cloud providers, and AI infrastructure leaders. The team is responsible for accelerating customer adoption and time-to-revenue for Marvell’s industry-leading networking and compute silicon. Our engineers work deeply embedded with customers, providing hands-on technical leadership across hardware, software, and system integration. This close engagement has built long-standing, high-trust relationships that are critical to Marvell’s growth and market leadership. What You Can Expect As a Senior Principal Application Engineer, you will serve as a technical authority and customer-facing leader within Marvell’s Customer Solutions Group. This role is designed for a highly experienced engineer who combines deep technical expertise with strong customer engagement skills and the ability to influence both internal development teams and external partners. You will work closely with hyperscale, cloud, and AI infrastructure customers to enable successful design-in, integration, and deployment of Marvell’s networking and switching solutions. You will also play a key role in shaping best practices, mentoring other application engineers, and driving complex customer engagements from early architecture through production. This position has no direct people management responsibility, but carries significant technical leadership and influence across teams and programs.

Requirements

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
15+ years of experience in networking, data center, or cloud infrastructure environments, with a strong focus on system and switch software.
Extensive experience in customer-facing application engineering or systems engineering roles.
Deep hands-on experience with:
Switch driver development
SAI (Switch Abstraction Interface)
SONiC or similar open networking operating systems
Strong understanding of switch software architecture, including interaction between drivers, firmware, NOS, and hardware abstraction layers.
Proven ability to debug complex issues spanning software, firmware, and silicon interfaces.
Experience working directly with customers to design and deliver software architecture solutions for production deployments.
Excellent communication skills, with the ability to present complex software concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Nice To Haves

Experience with hyperscale or Tier-1 data center customers deploying SONiC-based or disaggregated networking solutions.
Familiarity with Linux kernel, networking subsystems, and user-space networking applications.
Understanding of networking protocols (e.g., L2/L3 switching, routing, telemetry, QoS) in a production environment.
Exposure to VLSI or silicon architecture concepts and how software interacts with hardware capabilities.
Experience influencing product roadmaps through customer feedback and system-level insights.

Responsibilities

Act as a senior technical authority for Marvell’s customers on switch software architecture, device drivers, and system software integration.
Lead complex customer engagements involving software bring-up, integration, and optimization of Marvell switching solutions.
Provide hands-on expertise in switch driver development, SAI-based implementations, and SONiC integration, supporting customers from early evaluation through production deployment.
Serve as the technical escalation point for critical customer issues related to software architecture, performance, stability, and feature enablement.
Work closely with customers to define software architecture solutions, including control plane, data plane, management plane, and orchestration interfaces.
Collaborate deeply with internal software, silicon, and systems teams to drive issue resolution, feature prioritization, and roadmap alignment.
Drive Proof of Concepts (POCs), software demonstrations, and customer training focused on Marvell’s switching software stack.
Analyze and debug complex issues across drivers, firmware, operating systems, and networking stacks, ensuring timely and high-quality resolution.
Develop and review software architecture documents, application notes, integration guides, and best-practice materials for internal and customer use.
Provide technical mentorship and guidance to other Application Engineers, raising overall software expertise within the Customer Solutions Group.
Represent Marvell in technical customer reviews, architecture discussions, and industry forums, positioning Marvell as a trusted software and systems partner.