Principal Software Engineer - Software

Position: Principal Software Engineer - Software Applications

As a Principal Software Engineer on the Software Applications (Apps) team, you will help architect, build, and maintain critical backend systems that support Hawk Eye 360's mission. You will design and implement scalable solutions for real-time satellite scheduling algorithms, customer management systems, and data delivery platforms. This is a high‑impact role where your contributions will directly affect our operational efficiency and customer success.

As

the Principal Software Engineer - Software Applications, your main responsibilities will be:

• Design, implement, and maintain backend services using Spring Boot and related technologies.
• Develop advanced constellation scheduling algorithms that optimize for Hawk Eye 360’s unique RF collection needs.
• Design and implement scheduling workflows to facilitate real‑time satellite tasking and data downlink. Collaborating closely with Ground Systems, Command & Control engineers, and stakeholders.
• Build robust systems for customer data management and automated data delivery workflows.
• Collaborate with product managers, data scientists, and satellite operations engineers to develop tailored solutions.
• Write clean, testable, and efficient code following best practices in software engineering.
• Improve system reliability, scalability, and performance through continuous optimization.
• Mentor junior developers and conduct code reviews to maintain a high standard of quality.
• Participate in Agile/Scrum ceremonies and help shape the team’s development processes.
• Monitor software deployments and respond to outages or feedback.

Your skills and qualifications:
Essential education and experience:

• 10+ years of experience in backend development, with strong expertise in Java and Spring Boot.
• Proven experience building scalable RESTful APIs and backend systems.
• Solid understanding of software architecture, microservices, and distributed systems.
• Experience with workflow orchestration technologies like Airflow or Argo Workflows.
• Experience with relational databases (e.g., Postgre
  
  SQL), caching (e.g., Redis), and message queues (e.g., Kafka, Rabbit
  
  MQ).
• Familiarity with cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, Azure, or GCP) and containerization (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes).
• Strong problem‑solving skills, especially in algorithm‑heavy or data‑intensive applications.
• Ability to work collaboratively in a fast‑paced environment and take ownership of complex problems.

Desirable:

• 3+ years experience with Spring Boot. Experience with Spring Cloud dependencies. Experience with Spring Security.
• Experience with open‑source constraint optimization or planning frameworks (e.g., for scheduling, routing, or resource allocation)
• Hands on experience with Gradle, Java 21, and Gitlab Pipelines.
• Familiarity with AWS (Amazon Web Services) with a basic understanding of some of the following: EC2, RDS, EKS, EBS, EFS sufficient to be able to deploy applications in a cloud environment.
• An understanding of Virtualization versus Containerization with hands on experience with one or more of KVM, Virtual Box, Docker, Kubernetes, ISTIO.
• Experience with distributed architecture, cluster concepts, message brokers, information storage and retrieval (network file systems, databases, cache).
• Polyglot programming and framework skills (Java, JavaScript, Python, Go, C, Spring, Spring Boot, OCI, K8S)
• Experience in scheduling, optimization algorithms, or working with satellite/remote sensing data.

Base Salary Range:

$170,000 - $200,000 annually

Hawk Eye 360 offers a compensation package that includes a competitive base salary plus annual performance bonus and benefits. We consider many factors when determining salary offers, such as candidate's work experience, education, training & skills, as well as market and business considerations. We are also open to considering candidates with experience and qualifications at a different level than required in a job posting, which may affect the compensation package offered.

Company

Overview:

Hawk Eye 360 is delivering a revolutionary source of global knowledge based on radio frequency (RF) geospatial analytics to those working to make the world a safer place. The company operates a commercial satellite…