Senior Software Engineer, AI Inference

Job Summary

At Red Hat we believe the future of AI is open and we are on a mission to bring the power of open-source LLMs and vLLM to every enterprise. The Red Hat AI Inference team accelerates AI for the enterprise and brings operational simplicity to GenAI deployments. As leading developers and maintainers of the vLLM project and inventors of state-of-the-art techniques for model compression our team provides a stable platform for enterprises to build optimize and scale LLM deployments.

We are seeking an experienced Senior Software Engineer to build and release the Red Hat AI Inference Server. You will own the full lifecycle from compiling vLLM wheels across multiple hardware backends and architectures to packaging enterprise-grade container images managing multi-cloud infrastructure and validating LLM accuracy and performance across a growing matrix of models and hardware. You will be building and shipping a product that runs on some of the most powerful AI hardware in production today working across the full stack from C/CUDA kernel compilation to Kubernetes-orchestrated model serving on OpenShift. If you want to work at the intersection of systems engineering release engineering and AI infrastructure on one of the most popular open-source projects on GitHub this is the role for you.

Join us in shaping the future of AI!

What you will do

• Build and release vLLM wheels across multiple hardware backends and CPU architectures managing complex native dependency chains including PyTorch Triton and other accelerator-specific libraries

• Design and maintain CI/CD pipelines spanning multiple platforms including GitHub Actions GitLab CI and Buildkite for build test and release workflows

• Manage and scale multi-cloud GPU infrastructure using Terraform and Ansible including both bare-metal and Kubernetes-based compute runners

• Own the model validation pipeline orchestrating accuracy evaluation performance benchmarking tool-calling validation and smoke testing across dozens of LLMs on both bare metal and OpenShift

• Develop and maintain the Python tooling and automation that powers the build packaging validation and release processes

• Drive adoption of agentic AI and intelligent automation to streamline engineering workflows accelerate debugging and reduce toil across the team

What you will bring

• 5 years of software engineering experience with significant depth in build systems release engineering or infrastructure

• Strong Python development skills with experience building well-tested maintainable tooling and automation

• Hands-on experience building and packaging Python projects with native compiled extensions including familiarity with C and CUDA build toolchains wheel packaging and multi-architecture builds

• Deep familiarity with container ecosystems including Dockerfiles and Containerfiles image registries and container build pipelines

• Understanding of LLM evaluation methodology including accuracy benchmarks such as MMLU GSM8K and HellaSwag as well as inference performance metrics like throughput and latency

• Experience with CI/CD platforms such as GitHub Actions GitLab CI Tekton or Buildkite

• Solid understanding of release engineering practices including reproducible builds artifact management dependency pinning and security scanning

• Experience with infrastructure-as-code tools such as Terraform and Ansible and managing cloud resources at scale

• Working knowledge of Kubernetes and/or OpenShift for deploying and testing workloads

• Enthusiasm for applying LLM-based agents and AI-assisted tools to automate engineering workflows with a track record of identifying repetitive processes and replacing them with intelligent automation

• Excellent communication skills capable of interacting effectively with both technical and non-technical team members.

• A Bachelors or Masters degree in computer science computer engineering or a related field. A Ph.D. in an ML-related domain is a significant advantage.

The following is considered a plus:

• Contributions to upstream open-source projects particularly vLLM PyTorch or other AI/ML infrastructure

• Experience with GPU-accelerated workloads and building software for heterogeneous hardware

• Familiarity with LLM inference serving model optimization quantization techniques or evaluation frameworks

• Proficiency in C

#LI-MD2

#AI-HIRING

Pay Transparency

Red Hat determines compensation based on several factors including but not limited to job location experience applicable skills and training external market value and internal pay equity. Annual salary is one component of Red Hats compensation package. This position may also be eligible for bonus commission and/or equity. For positions with Remote-US locations the actual salary range for the position may differ based on location but will be commensurate with job duties and relevant work experience.

About Red Hat

Red Hat is the worlds leading provider of enterprise open source software solutions using a community-powered approach to deliver high-performing Linux cloud container and Kubernetes technologies. Spread across 40 countries our associates work flexibly across work environments from in-office to office-flex to fully remote depending on the requirements of their role. Red Hatters are encouraged to bring their best ideas no matter their title or tenure. Were a leader in open source because of our open and inclusive environment. We hire creative passionate people ready to contribute their ideas help solve complex problems and make an impact.

Benefits
Comprehensive medical dental and vision coverage
Flexible Spending Account - healthcare and dependent care
Health Savings Account - high deductible medical plan
Retirement 401(k) with employer match
Paid time off and holidays
Paid parental leave plans for all new parents
Leave benefits including disability paid family medical leave and paid military leave
Additional benefits including employee stock purchase plan family planning reimbursement tuition reimbursement transportation expense account employee assistance program and more!

Note: These benefits are only applicable to full time permanent associates at Red Hat located in the United States.

Inclusion at Red Hat
Red Hats culture is built on the open source principles of transparency collaboration and inclusion where the best ideas can come from anywhere and anyone. When this is realized it empowers people from different backgrounds perspectives and experiences to come together to share ideas challenge the status quo and drive innovation. Our aspiration is that everyone experiences this culture with equal opportunity and access and that all voices are not only heard but also celebrated. We hope you will join our celebration and we welcome and encourage applicants from all the beautiful dimensions that compose our global village.

Equal Opportunity Policy (EEO)
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