Principal Software Engineer, Retail Foundations

The Apple Retail Engineering team builds software systems for Apple Store customer experiences. The Retail Engineering Foundations group focuses on developer productivity, runtime environments, and common frameworks. As a Principal Software Engineer, you will define the long-term technical vision, strategy, and design for foundational frameworks, platforms, and systems that many Apple engineers and mission-critical production apps rely on daily. You will architect, design, develop, test, document, improve, and maintain infrastructure and code for DevOps, CI/CD, runtime environments, service discovery, API/RPC gateways, and observability for cloud-based, globally-distributed systems.

Must Have

• Architect, design, develop, test, document, improve, and maintain infrastructure and code for foundational systems.
• Own projects from strategy & planning to system architecture, implementation, and guiding adoption.
• Lead design and implementation of solutions for diverse Retail Engineering teams.
• Define multi-year technical strategy, architect, and lead development of multiple major software projects.
• 12+ years experience in commercial software systems as a Software and/or DevOps Engineer.
• 8+ years hands-on experience with high-scale, high-performance, highly available, fault-tolerant, and secure cloud-based distributed systems.
• 6+ years hands-on experience implementing and/or managing CI/CD pipelines and Infrastructure-as-Code solutions.
• 6+ years hands-on experience in Java and one of C++/Rust/Swift/Go/Python/TypeScript.
• Solid understanding of relational, NewSQL, and NoSQL databases, data modeling, and engineering concepts.
• Extensive knowledge of networking concepts & protocols.

Good to Have

• Graduate degrees.
• Longer experience than 12 years.
• Experience with more than two programming languages.
• Track record of mentoring junior, senior & staff level software engineers.
• Demonstration of strong written and verbal communication via presentations or published articles.
• Current or past involvement in and/or hands-on contributions to open source projects.
• Familiarity with compliance & security concepts (e.g. SOC2, SOX, CVEs, OWASP).

Perks & Benefits

• Opportunity to become an Apple shareholder through employee stock programs.
• Eligibility for discretionary restricted stock unit awards.
• Option to purchase Apple stock at a discount via Employee Stock Purchase Plan.
• Comprehensive medical and dental coverage.
• Retirement benefits.
• Range of discounted products and free services.
• Reimbursement for certain educational expenses related to career advancement.
• Eligibility for discretionary bonuses or commission payments.
• Relocation eligibility.

Apple is where individual imaginations gather together, committing to the values that lead to great work. Every new product we build, service we create, or Apple Store experience we deliver is the result of us making each other’s ideas stronger. That happens because every one of us shares a belief that we can make something wonderful and share it with the world. Retail Engineering team builds the software systems that power all the magical experiences we offer to our Apple Store customers, be it digital or in-person. As a part of this organization, Retail Engineering Foundations group focuses on developer productivity, runtime environments, and common frameworks & platforms for all Retail Engineering teams. When you join Retail Foundations as a principal-level Software Engineer, you’ll define the long-term technical vision, strategy, and design for foundational frameworks, platforms, and systems that many engineers and mission-critical production apps rely on every day. Together, we’ll explore all the ways to improve the software development lifecycle of Apple Store software from code to production, freeing our engineers to do what they do best: Crafting magical experiences for our customers.

As a principal-level Software Engineer, you will architect, design, develop, test, document, improve, and maintain infrastructure and code for frameworks, platforms, and systems for DevOps, CI/CD, runtime environments for dev/test/prod, service discovery, API/RPC gateways, observability, and other similar foundational components of cloud-based, globally-distributed systems. You will own every aspect of your projects, from strategy & planning to system architecture, from hands-on implementation to guiding adoption & migrations. You will be encouraged to play an extended role in collaboratively leading the design and implementation of solutions to address the requirements of a diverse set of Retail Engineering teams working on various aspects of online & in-person Apple Store experiences. Your architectural decisions and technical leadership will set precedents that could extend beyond Retail Engineering, with your solutions becoming reference implementations and standards adopted across other organizations. The ideal candidate is self-motivated, proactive and results-driven. Attention to detail, dedication to providing high-quality solutions modeling engineering excellence, and ability to work towards timely delivery of projects are all crucial qualities needed to work as a Software Engineer. The ideal candidate will also possess excellent communication and collaboration skills to work with various Retail Engineering teams and their leaders, various internal and external partners, and senior executive leaders.

• B.S. in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent professional work experience. Graduate degrees preferred.
• 12+ years experience working on commercial software systems in a professional capacity as a Software and/or DevOps Engineer. Longer experience strongly preferred.
• 8+ years hands-on experience designing, implementing, shipping, and maintaining high-scale, high-performance, highly available, fault-tolerant, and secure cloud-based distributed systems, including hands-on experience with monolith and microservices architectures, service discovery, API/RPC gateways, and end-to-end observability.
• 6+ years hands-on experience implementing and/or managing CI/CD pipelines and Infrastructure-as-Code solutions to build, test, deploy, and release containerized software applications on cloud-based Kubernetes (e.g. AWS EKS, GCP GKE, Azure AKS, etc.) using build systems similar to Bazel and/or Gradle in a polyglot repository context (i.e. mix of monorepos and polyrepos).
• 6+ years hands-on experience in Java and one of C++/Rust/Swift/Go/Python/TypeScript, including mastery in concurrency, memory management, and performance optimization techniques. Experience with more than two programming languages strongly preferred.
• Solid understanding of relational, NewSQL, and NoSQL in-memory & on-disk databases, as well as data modeling and engineering concepts, data warehouses and data lakes, including schema design, query optimization, and orchestrating transactional data interactions between datastores in globally-distributed systems.
• Extensive knowledge of networking concepts & protocols (e.g. HTTP/HTTPS, CDN, edge computing, load balancing, OSI model, etc.).
• Track record of defining multi-year technical strategy for, architecting, leading the development of, and successfully launching multiple major software projects that span multiple, globally-distributed teams across multiple organizations as a hands-on tech lead (TL).

• Track record of mentoring junior, senior & staff level software engineers, and successfully guiding them through their career growth journeys.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with mastery of long-form writing. Demonstration via presentations in public conferences and/or published articles strongly preferred.
• Current or past involvement in and/or hands-on contributions to open source projects.
• Familiarity with compliance & security concepts (e.g. SOC2, SOX, CVEs, OWASP, etc.).

At , base pay is one part of our total compensation package and is determined within a range. This provides the opportunity to progress as you grow and develop within a role. The base pay range for this role is between $212,000 and $386,300, and your base pay will depend on your skills, qualifications, experience, and location.

employees also have the opportunity to become an shareholder through participation in ’s discretionary employee stock programs. employees are eligible for discretionary restricted stock unit awards, and can purchase stock at a discount if voluntarily participating in ’s Employee Stock Purchase Plan. You’ll also receive benefits including: Comprehensive medical and dental coverage, retirement benefits, a range of discounted products and free services, and for formal education related to advancing your career at , reimbursement for certain educational expenses — including tuition. Additionally, this role might be eligible for discretionary bonuses or commission payments as well as relocation. Learn more about Benefits.

Note: benefit, compensation and employee stock programs are subject to eligibility requirements and other terms of the applicable plan or program.

is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. We seek to promote equal opportunity for all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, Veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. Learn more about your EEO rights as an applicant

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accepts applications to this posting on an ongoing basis.