Staff Forward Deployed Engineer

DigitalOcean • San Francisco, CA

3d • Remote

About The Position

DigitalOcean is seeking a Staff Forward Deployed Engineer passionate about solving complex cloud infrastructure challenges in the fast-growing AI/ML space. This high-impact role serves as the "technical tip of the spear" for strategic AI-Native (ANE) customers, operating at the intersection of Product Engineering and Customer Implementation. The FDE will be embedded directly with key customers to drive transformational AI adoption, collaborating with their teams to build advanced AI applications that solve real-world business problems. Responsibilities include building tools, migration scripts, and AI starter kits that scale the DigitalOcean AI Cloud ecosystem, accelerating "time-to-inference" in production and providing critical feedback to inform the product roadmap based on demanding AI workloads.

Requirements

• Significant experience in the AI/ML lifecycle, specifically hosting large language or multimodal models using inference engines like vLLM, SGLang, or Modular.
• Deep understanding of common LLM architectures and optimization techniques (e.g., continuous batching, quantization).
• Subject matter expert on modern GPU families (NVIDIA/AMD) and their software stacks (CUDA, ROCm, TensorRT, OpenAI Triton).
• Expert proficiency in Kubernetes (K8s) and the design of distributed systems, including microservices, messaging systems, databases, and Infrastructure as Code.
• Ability to seamlessly integrate AI workloads with core cloud services (Networking, VPC, Storage, Compute).
• Hands-on experience with distributed inference serving frameworks (e.g., llm-d, NVIDIA Dynamo, or Ray Serve).
• Understanding of GPU-level optimization and experience with interconnect technologies like NVlink, XGMI, or RoCE to maximize hardware efficiency.
• Strong production coding skills in Python or Go with the ability to build high-quality tools, automation, and internal assets.
• Proven ability to benchmark AI infrastructure and perform GPU utilization tuning to optimize customer ROI and workload performance.
• Proven ability to establish instant technical credibility with CTOs and Lead Architects while managing high-stakes technical migrations.

Nice To Haves

• Preferred Experience with emerging AI orchestration frameworks like LangGraph, CrewAI, or LlamaIndex.
• A background in technical consulting or "Forward Deployed" roles at high-growth AI or infrastructure companies.
• Experience building and scaling "Center of Excellence" models or partner delivery frameworks.
• Active contributor to open-source AI projects or technical communities.

Responsibilities

• Partner deeply with strategic ANEs to manage complex migrations, build production-ready PoCs, and execute hands-on application builds on our GPU infrastructure.
• Operationalize field learning by building migration planners, reusable systems, benchmarking frameworks, model optimization agents, and deployment automation scripts (e.g., Terraform/Pulumi) that standardize how AI workloads are deployed and tuned across DigitalOcean.
• Create pre-built GenAI agents, solution templates, and notebooks (e.g., LangGraph, CrewAI) tailored to popular and advanced business needs.
• Act as the frontline technical voice for CPTO, surfacing architectural gaps and edge cases to inform core product development and transition field-built tools into native product features.
• Lead the early testing and integration of emerging AI frameworks to ensure a first-class developer experience on DigitalOcean.
• Co-develop delivery frameworks with Strategic and Technical partners to enable repeatable, high-quality deployments at scale.
• Produce field-tested demo kits and deployment guides that support new product releases with practical, validated assets.

Benefits

• Competitive array of benefits to support you from our Employee Assistance Program to Local Employee Meetups to flexible time off policy
• Reimbursement for relevant conferences, training, and education
• Access to LinkedIn Learning's 10,000+ courses
• Bonus in addition to base salary
• Equity compensation to eligible employees, including equity grants upon hire and the option to participate in our Employee Stock Purchase Program

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Education Level: No Education Listed