Network Engineer - Planning & Procurement

About xAI

xAI’s mission is to create AI systems that can accurately understand the universe and aid humanity in its pursuit of knowledge. Our team is small, highly motivated, and focused on engineering excellence. This organization is for individuals who appreciate challenging themselves and thrive on curiosity. We operate with a flat organizational structure. All employees are expected to be hands-on and to contribute directly to the company’s mission. Leadership is given to those who show initiative and consistently deliver excellence. Work ethic and strong prioritization skills are important. All employees are expected to have strong communication skills. They should be able to concisely and accurately share knowledge with their teammates.

ABOUT THE ROLE:

We run a global backbone and edge network that enables our external customers a highly available consistent experience on our products as well as unleashing our internal teams to innovate and iterate quickly and securely. As the lead Network Planning and Procurement engineer, you will own all peering, transit, backbone circuits, dark fiber, IP space and the respective vendor relationships. You will also own the company's strategy, roadmap, approval to leadership and delivery for these aforementioned items from a procurement standpoint. You will work next to our backbone and edge network engineers to turn their high level designs into real world production capacity. You will also work closely with the finance team, creating supporting CAPEX/OPEX models with forecasting, unit costs to track cost efficiencies over time as well as gaining buy-in from leadership on strategic ventures.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Secure the company's future with your deep understanding of the technical aspects of the technologies you will procure, current market trends, and future capacity exhaustion points around the world
• Partner with multiple different teams/companies and bring a cohesive path forward
• Relentlessly and rapidly push forward and dive into any and every challenge that presents itself
• Ruthlessly leverage and drive your industry partners to deliver at our pace for maximum weekly impact

BASIC QUALIFICATIONS:

• 10+ years in the industry for planning backbone and edge capacity with 5+ in hyper scale environments.
• Deep understanding and experience for designing physically diverse global backbones and edge networks from the design RFP/RFQ stage, through cost negotiations and driving vendors to deliver in expedited timelines.
• 5+ years of creating finance models and projections from capacity planning sessions with engineers.
• Previous experience in Network Operations/Service Delivery. Can troubleshoot common issues with vendors and brain storm ideas to move past blockers and expedite turn-ups.
• US citizen or Green Card holder.
• Ability to code in python to help contribute to topology and capacity forecasting models.

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:

$180,000 - $440,000 USD

Base salary is just one part of our total rewards package at xAI, which also includes equity, comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage, access to a 401(k) retirement plan, short & long-term disability insurance, life insurance, and various other discounts and perks.

xAI is an equal opportunity employer. For details on data processing, view our Recruitment Privacy Notice.