Remote opportunity at
ChainguardPrincipal Software Engineer, Containers
Chainguard is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to lead its core container product engineering group. Operating as the most senior individual contributor on an approximate fifteen-person…
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About This Role
Chainguard is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to lead its core container product engineering group. Operating as the most senior individual contributor on an approximate fifteen-person team, this role establishes the technical vision for Chainguard Containers, registry performance, build pipelines, and developer tooling. The position focuses on setting architectural paths, guiding major cross-team initiatives, and collaborating closely with engineering and product leaders, while remaining hands-on with code and system operations.…
Job Description
Chainguard is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to lead its core container product engineering group. Operating as the most senior individual contributor on an approximate fifteen-person team, this role establishes the technical vision for Chainguard Containers, registry performance, build pipelines, and developer tooling. The position focuses on setting architectural paths, guiding major cross-team initiatives, and collaborating closely with engineering and product leaders, while remaining hands-on with code and system operations. This is a technical leadership track rather than a management role.
The successful candidate will shape security foundations for software and AI agent workflows, working with technologies such as Wolfi, Sigstore, and the OCI image format. Preferred locations include the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Germany, with no visa sponsorship or relocation assistance available.
Responsibilities
- Establish the one to three-year technical direction and architecture for the build pipeline, registry, and adoption tooling of Chainguard Containers
- Collaborate with engineering and product leaders to shape the product roadmap and deliver multi-team projects from concept through production
- Write and review code weekly while addressing the most challenging engineering problems
- Design and execute adoption tooling including migration utilities for Dockerfiles and MCP servers for AI agents
- Mentor and grow senior and staff engineers into future technical leaders through design reviews and code standards
- Maintain system health through observability, incident management, and on-call participation
Requirements
- Over 10 years of experience building and operating software utilized by paying customers
- Demonstrated experience as a technical lead for large, multi-team projects in hyper-growth or startup environments
- Direct experience in container registries, container images, OCI image format, build systems, Linux distributions, package management, or software supply chain security
- Architectural depth in Go programming, API design, databases, caching, and cloud infrastructure on GCP or AWS
- Familiarity utilizing daily agentic coding tools and setting safety standards for AI usage
Qualifications
- Deep background in software supply chain security encompassing SBOMs, Sigstore signing, or SLSA frameworks
- Experience as a maintainer or significant contributor to open-source tools like Wolfi, apko, melange, containerd, Kubernetes, or OCI specifications
- Track record of guiding a product from early customer stages to widespread adoption
- Familiarity with Terraform or other infrastructure-as-code tools
- Non-traditional engineering background acquired through practical building
Core Skills
Benefits
- Stock options upon hire and promotion with secondary offerings and a 10-year exercise window
- 100% coverage of health, vision, and dental insurance premiums for employees and dependents
- Flexible time off policy
- 18 weeks of paid parental leave for birthing parents and 12 weeks for non-birthing parents
- Monthly stipend covering coworking spaces, phone, and internet costs, along with bi-annual destination summits
Frequently Asked Questions
Answers are based only on the employer’s listing; where it doesn’t say, neither do we.
What is the salary range for this position?
The base salary range is USD 229,000 to 258,000 per year.
Where is the role located?
The position is remote, with the United States preferred, and open to candidates in Canada, the United Kingdom, and Germany.
Does Chainguard provide visa sponsorship or relocation?
No, visa sponsorship and relocation assistance are not available for this role.
Sample Interview Questions
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