Principal Software Engineer - Data Infrastructure

Job title: Principal Software Engineer - Data Infrastructure

About the Role HubSpot’s Data Infrastructure team builds the shared data store platforms that power the company’s products and internal systems at scale. We’re seeking a Principal Software Engineer to own the architecture and evolution of HubSpot’s foundational data systems and to shape how our data stores scale and how developers interact with them. This is a deeply hands-on role for a builder who stays close to the code and drives long-term platform direction across multiple domains.

What You'll Do

• Own the future of HubSpot’s data stores and shape the technical direction for data platforms underpinning our products, focusing on the stores themselves and the surrounding systems.
• Drive architectural decisions across storage, access patterns, scaling models, tenancy, performance, and developer ergonomics.
• Define what the next generation of HubSpot’s database platform should look like, not just how to operate the current one.
• Write production code regularly and lead complex initiatives from idea to rollout.
• Build internal frameworks, APIs, and platform capabilities that make HubSpot’s data stores easier to adopt, extend, and evolve.
• Turn ambiguous infrastructure problems into simple, scalable systems and clear technical direction.
• Lead platform architecture across multiple domains: big data, SQL/Vitess, batch, stream processing, and search; establish reusable abstractions for data storage, ingestion, processing, and access.
• Push for simplicity, clarity, and extensibility in systems that could become bespoke or operationally heavy.
• Influence across the broader engineering organization by partnering with engineering and product leaders, guiding technical tradeoffs, and mentoring teams through design reviews and principled decision-making.

What We're Looking For

• Deep experience building and evolving large-scale distributed systems, especially storage systems, data infrastructure, or foundational backend platforms.
• Strong architectural instincts with a bias toward simplicity, consistency, clear boundaries, and long-term platform leverage.
• A track record of owning and delivering cross-team technical initiatives with product-line or company-wide impact.
• Comfort working across multiple layers of the stack—from storage engines and data flows to APIs, internal frameworks, and developer experience.
• A hands-on mindset: you lead by building, debugging, reviewing, and shipping, not by staying removed from the systems you influence.
• Ability to move into unfamiliar technical territory quickly, form strong opinions grounded in first principles, and help teams make better long-term decisions.

Nice to Have

• Experience with storage engines and big data technologies such as HBase, Kafka, MySQL/Vitess, S3, Hadoop.
• Prior experience leading cross-team platform initiatives and mentoring engineers.

Compensation & Benefits

• Cash compensation includes base salary, on-target commission, and annual bonus targets; eligibility for HubSpot’s equity plan (RSUs) and possibly overtime pay where applicable. Compensation packages are tailored to skills and experience, in line with HubSpot’s compensation philosophy.
• Explore HubSpot’s benefits and perks as part of total compensation and growth opportunities.