Senior Software Engineer - Virtual Machines (RD222)

Defense Unicorns is building UDS VM, a product for securely deploying and managing virtual machines alongside containerized workloads in the UDS platform. The Senior Software Engineer will shape and deliver software capabilities for VM orchestration, lifecycle management, and secure operation in disconnected environments.

Responsibilities:

• Own the design, implementation, testing, and delivery of complex software features and systems
• Drive pragmatic technical decisions and contribute to architecture across product components
• Proactively identify and resolve ambiguity in collaboration with Product, UX, and Mission Heroes
• Debug complex issues across Kubernetes, virtualization, storage, networking, and operating systems
• Improve the reliability, security, performance, observability, and maintainability of our software
• Review code, mentor teammates, and help establish strong engineering practices
• Document technical decisions, communicate clearly, and collaborate effectively across teams

Requirements:

• THIS POSITION REQUIRES U.S. CITIZENSHIP
• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience
• Strong proficiency in Go or another modern programming language, with an interest in developing Go-based systems
• Experience designing and building software that interacts with Kubernetes or other distributed systems
• Strong understanding of APIs, system design, and software architecture
• Experience developing backend services, controllers, operators, or developer tooling
• Familiarity with Linux systems, containers, and operating system concepts
• Experience building, testing, and operating production software
• Ability to navigate ambiguity, evaluate technical tradeoffs, and independently drive complex work to completion
• Strong problem-solving skills and ability to debug across multiple system boundaries
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills, including the ability to influence technical direction and mentor other engineers
• Experience with KubeVirt, QEMU/KVM, or other virtualization technologies
• Experience developing Kubernetes operators, controllers, or custom resource definitions (CRDs)
• Experience configuring, managing, or troubleshooting Windows virtual machines
• Familiarity with VM image formats, conversion, migration, and lifecycle management
• Experience with Kubernetes networking and storage
• Experience building CLI tools, particularly in Go
• Familiarity with Zarf, OCI artifacts, or software packaging and distribution
• Experience working in air-gapped, disconnected, or regulated environments
• Contributions to Kubernetes, KubeVirt, or other CNCF open-source projects
• Experience building security-focused software or integrating systems with identity, access control, and observability platforms