Senior Platform Engineer - Army (FedD169/FedD170)
Note: This position requires an active united states security clearance.
Location: United States, Remote - Travel 25% to Hawaii
About Us:
Defense Unicorns is seeking a Senior Platform Engineer to join our Army team, focused on building and operating product-aligned platform capabilities that enable how our software is developed, validated, and experienced.
This role is responsible for creating and owning persistent, always-on environments and integration layers across the UDS platform, including Fleet Management, Edge Management, and system-level components. These environments power internal dogfooding, UX validation, and customer demos, reducing reliance on ad-hoc local setups and enabling scalable, repeatable, and delightful product experiences.
Today, engineers are frequently pulled into demo setup and environment management, creating context switching and slowing product delivery. This role exists to solve that problem by establishing reliable, self-service environments and tighter system integration, allowing engineering teams to focus on building while improving overall product quality and usability.
You will operate at the intersection of platform engineering and product development, ensuring that the systems we build can be continuously exercised, validated, and experienced in real-world conditions. You will be responsible for advocating for a delightful customer product experience as the integrator of the product portfolio.
Key Responsibilities
Design and operate always-on product environments for customer demos, internal use, and stakeholder access
Build feature branch and preview environments to support UX and rapid feedback loops
Enable internal dogfooding through real, long-running deployments of UDS products
Integrate core system components across Fleet Management, Edge Management, OS, and related services
Reduce reliance on local environments by creating shared, reproducible infrastructure
Support pathways toward self-service demo and trial environments
Improve system reliability by enabling continuous, real-world usage and validation
Partner with engineering, product, and UX to ensure environments reflect real user scenarios
Contribute to platform and product architecture decisions where environments and integration are concerned
Required Qualifications
US citizenship and eligibility to obtain a clearance
Strong experience in platform engineering, DevOps, or infrastructure-focused software engineering
Hands-on experience with cloud environments, specifically Azure
Deep familiarity with Kubernetes and container-based systems
Experience with Helm, GitOps workflows, and Infrastructure as Code (e.g., Terraform, Pulumi)
Experience building and operating shared or multi-tenant environments
Strong understanding of CI/CD and deployment pipelines
Experience integrating distributed systems across multiple services
Comfortable working across system boundaries (application, infrastructure, networking)
Proficiency with Linux/Unix systems
Strong problem-solving skills and ability to operate independently in ambiguous environments
Strong communication skills and ability to collaborate across engineering, product, and UX
Preferred Qualifications
Active Secret clearance
System image/architecture and deployment experience
Familiarity with the Army, Army Software Factory, or similar DoD software organizations
Experience with Zarf or UDS
Full compensation packages are based on candidate experience. Compensation ranges are established using national benchmarking data and apply across all geographic locations within the United States.
Remote - USA
$148,750—$201,250 USD