Principal Engineer (Product Architecture, JetBrains Cloud Platform)

At JetBrains, we’re building an AI-native platform for software development that connects developer workflows, team-level collaboration, and organizational control into a single coherent system. This platform will serve as the execution and governance layer for AI-driven development, deeply integrated with developer tools but designed to work across teams, products, and environments. This is a long-term strategic investment for JetBrains and a key pillar of our vision for the future of software development.

The role

We are looking for a Software Architect (Product Architecture) to drive architecture within a specific product area.

This role focuses on owning end-to-end architecture for a product domain: making sure product requirements translate into a coherent technical design, that the domain evolves sustainably, and that the product aligns with platform capabilities and constraints. You’ll be the architectural “center of gravity” for a domain, partnering closely with engineers and product stakeholders while collaborating with platform architects on shared foundations and integration contracts.

As this is a new platform, many standards and processes are still works in progress – you will help define them from the perspective of real product needs and delivery constraints.

As part of the team, you will

• Own the architecture of a specific product domain within JetBrains Cloud Platform and evolve it over time.
• Translate product and domain requirements into clear architectural designs and implementation approaches.
• Define service boundaries, domain models, data flows, and integration contracts, in line with platform standards.
• Drive key architectural decisions and trade-offs in your area (e.g., API design, persistence, reliability, performance, and migration paths).
• Ensure your domain architecture supports scalability, reliability, and observability from the outset.
• Review and validate architectural designs within your domain and team, raising quality and consistency.
• Collaborate with platform architects and other domain owners to align on cross-cutting decisions and shared interfaces.
• Work closely with senior and staff engineers to clarify requirements, reduce ambiguity, and support execution.

We are looking for someone who

• Has strong experience in software engineering and system design, with a track record of working on complex systems.
• Has experience owning architecture within a product or domain, including balancing delivery needs with long-term sustainability.
• Is comfortable aligning product needs with platform capabilities and constraints (and negotiating trade-offs when needed).
• Can facilitate architectural decision-making inside a team and across partner teams.
• Is comfortable working in an environment where many processes and standards are still being formed.
• Is motivated by long-term goals, designing for evolution rather than one-off implementations.

We’d be particularly thrilled if you

• Have experience designing product architectures that operate in cloud environments and integrate with multiple systems.
• Are strong at reasoning about architectural trade-offs in context (time-to-market vs correctness, flexibility vs complexity, etc.).
• Enjoy helping teams converge on good solutions through collaboration, not enforcement.

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