Staff Engineer, KernelCare

KernelCare provides automated live patching for Linux kernels without requiring reboots. Our Extended Lifecycle Support products keep end-of-life Linux distributions secure by backporting important security and bug fixes to older software versions used by enterprise customers.

About the role

We are seeking an experienced, hands-on Staff Engineer to build the next generation of automation and high-reliability pipelines for KernelCare. In this role, you will evaluate and optimize existing engineering workflows, leveraging AI to eliminate bottlenecks and drive a 10x increase in operational throughput.

This role combines deep technical execution with technical product ownership. It is approximately 70% hands-on software engineering and 30% technical product ownership.

You will take ownership of significant product components and workstreams. This includes understanding what needs to be built, working directly with stakeholders, defining milestones and tasks, designing the solution, contributing production code, delivering it to customers, and continuing to own it in production.

This is an individual contributor role focused on technical ownership rather than people management. We are looking for someone who can operate independently, work effectively with unclear requirements, and proactively move large areas of work forward without waiting for a manager to define each next step.

The products and priorities may evolve over time. Therefore, curiosity, adaptability, and a general interest in cybersecurity are important for this role.

Responsibilities:

• Own major product components and workstreams throughout their full lifecycle, from initial discovery and planning to production release and ongoing improvement.

• Work directly with engineering, product, sales, and other stakeholders to understand, gather, and clarify business and technical requirements.

• Translate broad and sometimes unclear product goals into technical plans, milestones, and actionable engineering tasks.

• Design scalable system architecture and make technical decisions for high-impact product areas.

• Build, review, and maintain production-grade components end-to-end, ensuring reliability, security, performance, maintainability, and extensibility.

• Take responsibility for delivered components in production and their continued operation and evolution.

• Independently track progress and proactively communicate results, blockers, risks, dependencies, and changing requirements.

• Research relevant technologies, tools, market approaches, and competitor solutions when needed.

• Contribute to engineering quality through design reviews, technical guidance, mentorship, and best practices.

Requirements

• Proven experience owning major projects or workstreams end-to-end.

• Strong backend engineering experience in Python.

• Comfortable reading and reviewing C language code.

• Strong hands-on Linux background.

• Strong system design and architectural thinking, combined with the ability to implement proposed solutions hands-on.

• Experience gathering and refining requirements and turning broad or unclear needs into technical plans, milestones, and deliverables.

• Strong technical product ownership and an understanding of how engineering decisions support broader product and business goals.

• Ability to work independently without close day-to-day supervision.

• Strong communication skills and confidence working directly with engineering teams, product stakeholders, sales, and other departments.

• Ability to clearly communicate technical decisions, progress, risks, and blockers.

• Regular use of AI-assisted development tools for planning, implementation, debugging, testing, refactoring, or code review. AI should be part of the development workflow rather than used only for occasional experimentation.

• Ability to balance short-term delivery with long-term scalability, maintainability, and extensibility.

Nice to have:

• Experience with writing patches for the Linux kernel or writing your own kernel modules

• Proficiency in C programming and debugging skills

• Deep understanding of how operating systems work

Benefits

What's in it for you?

• A focus on professional development.

• Interesting and challenging projects.

• Fully remote work with flexible working hours, that allows you to schedule your day and work from any location worldwide.

• Paid 24 days of vacation per year, 10 days of national holidays, and unlimited sick leaves.

• Compensation for private medical insurance.

• Co-working and gym/sports reimbursement.

• Budget for education.

• The opportunity to receive a reward for the most innovative idea that the company can patent.