Role Description:
Defense Unicorns is seeking a Senior Platform Engineer to join our Fleet 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 of the suite of products, 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 product capabilities 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.
What You'll Work On:- Designing and operating always-on product environments for customer demos, internal use, and stakeholder access
- Building feature branch / preview environments to support UX and rapid feedback loops
- Enabling internal dogfooding through real, long-running deployments of UDS products
- Integrating core system components across Fleet Management, Edge Management, OS, and related services
- Reducing reliance on local environments by creating shared, reproducible infrastructure
- Supporting pathways toward self-service demo and trial environmentsImproving system reliability by enabling continuous, real-world usage and validationPartnering with engineering, product, and UX to ensure environments reflect real user scenarios
- Design, build, and maintain scalable platform environments that support development, testing, and demos
- Own the reliability and usability of shared environments used across the team
- Collaborate closely with software engineers to integrate platform and product components
- Identify and close gaps in system integration across services and infrastructure layers
- Build and maintain infrastructure as code for reproducible environments
- Improve developer experience by reducing friction in environment setup and usage
- Support product demos and stakeholder access through stable, well-understood systems
- Contribute to platform and product architecture decisions where environments and integration are concerned
Travel Expectations/Requirements: 10-20%
The listed responsibilities are not exhaustive and additional responsibilities may be assigned based on the evolving needs of the organization. We are seeking a dynamic individual who is able to adapt and take on new responsibilities as they arise.
Preferred Experience and Qualifications:- Strong experience in platform engineering, DevOps, or infrastructure-focused software engineering
- Deep familiarity with Kubernetes and container-based systems
- Experience building and operating shared or multi-tenant environments
- Proficiency with infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, Pulumi, etc.)
- Strong understanding of CI/CD, GitOps, 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
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.
Defense Unicorns delivers mission value by streamlining software delivery so our customers can focus on the most important challenges. We share a vision of freedom and security for the advancement of progress and innovation. Our commitment to this vision, and to our mission-driven customers, means a commitment to speed, user experience and optionality, without compromising security. Our team is composed of innovators, software engineers, and veterans with decades of experience delivering technology programs across the federal market.
What We DoWe create and deliver secure solutions for continuous software integration and delivery. Defense Unicorns consolidates the best practices for security pipelines, testing, and deployment automation in order to meet the high security requirements valued by mission owners. Our solutions are agnostic by design and we believe that growing a robust ecosystem of secure, cloud-native software solutions can help enterprise customers inside and outside the federal market buy and integrate software more easily.
Who We ServeDefense Unicorns’ customers are mission-focused leaders across public and private enterprises. We proudly support defense and civil agencies across the U.S. government and we work closely with the creators of leading-edge software solutions to deliver value to the mission-owner by improving the security and consumability of commercial software products.
What We Work On- Kubernetes
- Cloud Environments (AWS/GCP and Azure)
- Infrastructure-as-code (like Terraform/Pulumi)
- Continuous Delivery and automation tooling
- GitOps
- Containers
- CNCF projects and open source products and packages
- Helm/Kustomize-Value Stream Mapping
- Building and improving security delivery
- Building Kubernetes and cloud native applications
- Medical/Dental/Vision
- Premiums are 100% Company Paid
- Health Savings Account
- Life Insurance
- Disability Insurance
- 401k Retirement Plan
- Company Stock Options
- Home Office Budget
- We offer all full-time Unicorns Flexible Time Off (FTO) plus all Federal Holidays, one week for Thanksgiving, and two weeks for Christmas and New Year’s
- Paid Parental Leave
- Reimbursement for approved trainings/subscriptions
- Conferences (travel, lodging, and fees)
Don’t have all the preferred experience or qualifications? Studies show that underrepresented groups like women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs if they don't meet every requirement listed.
At Defense Unicorns, we're committed to diversity. If you're enthusiastic about the role but don't match every criteria, we encourage you to apply. You could be the perfect fit for this or another role! Defense Unicorns is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, national origin, veteran status, genetic information, union status and/or beliefs, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law.
CCPA DISCLOSURE
Similar Jobs
What you need to know about the Chicago Tech Scene
Key Facts About Chicago Tech
- Number of Tech Workers: 245,800; 5.2% of overall workforce (2024 CompTIA survey)
- Major Tech Employers: McDonald’s, John Deere, Boeing, Morningstar
- Key Industries: Artificial intelligence, biotechnology, fintech, software, logistics technology
- Funding Landscape: $2.5 billion in venture capital funding in 2024 (Pitchbook)
- Notable Investors: Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Arch Venture Partners, MATH Venture Partners, Jump Capital, Hyde Park Venture Partners
- Research Centers and Universities: Northwestern University, University of Chicago, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Illinois Institute of Technology, Argonne National Laboratory, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
