Tech Lead, Platform Engineering

About Pinecone

Pinecone is pioneering search and database technology to power AI/ML applications for the next decade and beyond. We provide customers with capabilities that until now have only been in the hands of a few tech giants. Our R&D team includes founders of multiple startups and world-class engineers including the core team that created Amazon SageMaker.

We value integrity, passion, pushing boundaries, real-world problem solving, and a sense of humor. We work in collaboration, and encourage new ideas and initiatives.

About the Team and Role:

As a Tech Lead in the Platform Engineering team at Pinecone, you will be instrumental in shaping the technical direction, scalability, and efficiency of our platform infrastructure. This role is a blend of hands-on engineering and technical leadership. You will be responsible for leading a team of engineers in creating a seamless, reliable, and high-performance developer experience that accelerates productivity across all engineering teams. Reporting directly to the Director of Engineering, you will also work closely with cross-functional stakeholders to guide the evolution of our platform, ensuring it meets the growing demands of our applications in a secure, scalable, and robust manner.

In this role, you will work on:

• Technical Strategy and Best Practices.

• Lead technical initiatives and establish best practices within platform engineering, setting the direction for infrastructure, deployment processes, and developer tooling.

• Collaborate with the Director of Engineering to align platform solutions with company objectives, enabling agility and innovation across engineering.

• Provide technical mentorship, fostering a culture of high standards in platform development and encouraging team members to solve complex problems effectively.

• Developer experience:

  • We work closely with software engineers to align platform engineering efforts with development goals, ensuring seamless integration and support.

  • We build and maintain tools such as CLIs and manage development environments to streamline workflows and enhance productivity.

  • Communicating platform processes, configurations, and best practices ensures knowledge sharing through documentation and continuity, while providing support and guidance on building, testing, and deploying applications.

• Deployments:

  • We build our systems on top of Kubernetes and Cloud Run, with underlying infrastructure managed by Pulumi.

  • Our deployment process utilizes Kubernetes tooling, including Helm, Helmfile, and ArgoCD, to ensure smooth and efficient operations.

  • Using cloud-native technologies allows us to move fast while being present in different clouds.

• Builds:

  • We manage a monorepo with multiple projects, requiring efficient build automation to ensure a quick feedback cycle by building only necessary artifacts.

  • Our cross-platform environment necessitates building binaries for Intel and ARM architectures, utilizing containerization with technologies such as Docker builds, container registries, and image scanning.

  • We focus on building robust Rust and Python applications to drive our core functionalities.

• Testing:

  • We develop and maintain comprehensive automated testing frameworks, covering unit tests, integration tests, API tests, and property-based tests to ensure high-quality software releases.

  • Automated tests are integrated into the CI/CD pipeline to catch issues early, while also ensuring that tests can be run quickly both locally and in CI environments.

  • Testing distributed systems comes with unique challenges, and collaboration with engineering teams ensures comprehensive test coverage and effective solutions.

• Infrastructure:

  • We design, build, and maintain scalable, secure, and high-performance infrastructure across multiple cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, GCP, Azure), tackling the complexities of cross-cloud environments.

  • Infrastructure as code (IaC) practices are implemented using tools like Pulumi, Helm, and Kubernetes to ensure consistency and efficiency.

  • Monitoring infrastructure health, performance, and security is crucial, with proactive measures taken to address any issues and maintain robust operations.

Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field (or equivalent experience).

• 5+ years of experience in platform engineering, DevOps, or a similar role.

• Strong proficiency in managing CI/CD pipelines a