{"id":8757,"url":"https://alion.io/job/natera-principal-software-engineer","title":"Principal Software Engineer","company":{"id":3078,"name":"Natera","domain":"natera.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/natera","size_band":"1001-5000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":82,"open_postings":35,"ghost_share":0.086,"stale_share":0.457,"repost_share":0.114,"time_to_fill_p50_days":42,"computed_at":"2026-10-31T05:58:55Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"lead","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["South San Francisco, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":219800,"max":274700,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":274700},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":10,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":true,"technologies":[{"name":"AWS","optional":false},{"name":"Azure","optional":false},{"name":"Claude","optional":false},{"name":"Claude Code","optional":false},{"name":"Cursor","optional":false},{"name":"Dagster","optional":false},{"name":"ETL/ELT","optional":false},{"name":"GCP","optional":false},{"name":"HPC","optional":false},{"name":"Java","optional":false},{"name":"Kubernetes","optional":false},{"name":"LIMS","optional":false},{"name":"Model Context Protocol","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"Terraform","optional":false},{"name":"Django","optional":true},{"name":"Helm","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-06-16T19:14:58Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-12","last_verified_at":"2026-10-31T10:13:37Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":136,"trust":{"level":"ghost","repost_count":2,"flags":["stale","repost"],"days_open":136},"description":"Job Title: Principal Software Engineer\nLocation: South San Francisco, CA preferred; Remote optional\nJob Type: Full-time\nAbout the Role\nWe're seeking a Principal Software Engineer to join Natera's R&D team. We build the cloud infrastructure, workflow platforms, and data platforms that R&D uses to do its science - including a Kubernetes-based workflow execution platform, a custom R&D LIMS system, and a set of supporting tools that routinely handle production-scale workloads.\nThis is a senior technical role. You'll own the full architecture, implementation, and delivery of large projects across our platform. You'll partner with the team lead on roadmap and tough technical calls, mentor mid-level engineers, and help the team find the right solution for the problem - not the most elaborate one. We're a small team (4 engineers + lead) with broad scope, and we're heavily AI-augmented: every engineer uses Claude Code / Cursor as a daily tool, and we build our own AI tooling (custom plugins, MCP servers, agents) to multiply ourselves.\nResponsibilities\nArchitecture & Delivery: Own the design, implementation, and delivery of major initiatives across our platform. Take fuzzy problems through to shipped, working software used in production.\nTechnical Leadership: Lead architecture and design reviews. Help the team find the right solution for the problem and avoid unnecessary complexity. Influence technical decisions across the team.\nMentorship: Mentor mid-level engineers through code review, design docs, and pairing. Raise the engineering bar by example.\nAI-Native Development: Build and improve our AI-coding tooling alongside the rest of the team. Help us push the frontier of agent-driven software development inside the company.\nCross-Functional Partnership: Work with bioinformaticians, scientists, and other R&D engineers to understand their needs and translate them into platform capabilities. Partner with the team lead on roadmap, prioritization, and tough technical calls.\nRequired Experience\nYears of Experience: 10+ years of professional software engineering experience across a range of systems and problem types.\nCloud Infrastructure: Production experience with a major cloud platform (AWS preferred; GCP or Azure equivalent). You've designed for a cloud, not just deployed to one.\nContainer Orchestration: Production experience with Kubernetes (or equivalent). Comfortable reasoning about cluster design, scheduling, networking, and workload patterns.\nInfrastructure as Code: Production experience with Terraform (or equivalent). Comfortable owning shared modules and multi-environment deployments.\nProgramming: Strong proficiency in at least one general-purpose language (Python, Go, Java, or similar). Comfortable picking up new languages as needed - and comfortable using AI tooling to accelerate that.\nEnd-User Software: You've shipped software to end users (internal or external). You understand the realities of running a product - incongruent user feedback, competing priorities, the gap between requirements and what users actually need.\nTeam Leadership: You've led an engineering team before and have mentored junior engineers. You're comfortable being the technical owner of multi-quarter initiatives.\nStartup Background: You've worked in fast-moving environments where results need to be delivered quickly. Scrappy, MVP-first, comfortable shipping in days rather than weeks.\nFamiliarity with our tech stack: AWS, Kubernetes, Python, Go, Groovy, Terraform, Helm, Nextflow, WDL, Django, React.\nHow You Work\nProduct-Minded: You think in terms of business and user problems, not tickets. You ask \"should we build this?\" before \"how do I build this?\"\nCalibrated Judgement: You know when to move fast and break things, and when to slow down and double-check. The ability to dial this in based on context is something we hire specifically for.\nAI-Native Development: Actively excited about AI-native development. Not just willing to use Claude / Cursor, but actively interested in building tooling that makes your colleagues 10x faster.\nBonus\nDomain-Adjacent Experience: Prior work in any of the following helps you ramp faster, but is not required: scientific or bioinformatics computing, LIMS or laboratory data systems, workflow orchestration engines (Nextflow, WDL, Airflow, Argo, Temporal, Dagster, etc.), large-scale ETL or data pipeline systems, or HPC/batch-compute platforms.\nWhy Join Us\nWork on the software that powers Natera's R&D - a small, high-leverage team where individual contribution is highly visible.\nOperate at the frontier of AI-augmented software engineering. We don't just talk about AI tooling - we build it, and use it daily.\nSignificant autonomy and influence over the team's technical direction.\nCompetitive salary and benefits.\nWe value diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We encourage applicants of all backgrounds to apply.\nCompensation & Total Rewards \nThis range reflects a good-faith estimate of the base pay we reasonably expect to offer at the time of hire. Final compensation will vary based on experience, qualifications, and internal equity considerations.\nThis position is also eligible for additional compensation and benefits through Natera’s robust Total Rewards program, including:\nAnnual performance incentive bonus\n\nLong-term equity awards\n\nComprehensive health benefits (medical, dental, vision)\n\n401(k) with company match\n\nGenerous paid time off and company holidays\n\nAdditional wellness and work-life benefits\n\nCompensation Range\n$219,800—$274,700 USD\nOUR OPPORTUNITY\nNatera™ is a global leader in cell-free DNA (cfDNA) testing, dedicated to oncology, women’s health, and organ health. Our aim is to make personalized genetic testing and diagnostics part of the standard of care to protect health and enable earlier and more targeted interventions that lead to longer, healthier lives.\nThe Natera team consists of highly dedicated statisticians, geneticists, doctors, laboratory scientists, business professionals, software engineers and many other professionals from world-class institutions, who care deeply for our work and each other. When you join Natera, you’ll work hard and grow quickly. Working alongside the elite of the industry, you’ll be stretched and challenged, and take pride in being part of a company that is changing the landscape of genetic disease management.\nWHAT WE OFFER\nCompetitive Benefits - Employee benefits include comprehensive medical, dental, vision, life and disability plans for eligible employees and their dependents. Additionally, Natera employees and their immediate families receive free testing in addition to fertility care benefits. Other benefits include pregnancy and baby bonding leave, 401k benefits, commuter benefits and much more. We also offer a generous employee referral program!\nFor more information, visit www.natera.com.\nNatera is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to ensuring a diverse and inclusive workplace environment, and welcome people of different backgrounds, experiences, abilities and perspectives. Inclusive collaboration benefits our employees, our community and our patients, and is critical to our mission of changing the management of disease worldwide.\nAll qualified applicants are encouraged to apply, and will be considered without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, age, veteran status, disability or any other legally protected status. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with applicable laws.\nIf you are based in California, we encourage you to read this important information for California residents. \nLink: https://www.natera.com/notice-of-data-collection-california-residents/\nPlease be advised that Natera will reach out to candidates with a @natera.com email domain ONLY. Email communications from all other domain names are not from Natera or its employees and are fraudulent. Natera does not request interviews via text messages and does not ask for personal information until a candidate has engaged with the company and has spoken to a recruiter and the hiring team. Natera takes cyber crimes seriously, and will collaborate with law enforcement authorities to prosecute any related cyber crimes.\nFor more information:\n- BBB announcement on job scams \n- FBI Cyber Crime resource page","description_format":"text","description_chars":8456,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":10,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["401k plan","Equity"],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Diagnostic Tests & IVD","Genomics & Genetic Testing","Precision Medicine"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-06-16T19:14:58Z"},{"event":"close","at":"2026-09-02T18:06:50Z"},{"event":"reopen","at":"2026-09-17T18:12:52Z"},{"event":"close","at":"2026-09-21T15:01:36Z"},{"event":"reopen","at":"2026-10-12T19:45:31Z"}],"visa":[{"country":"US","licensed_sponsor":true,"evidence":"H-1B filings in 12 months: 74 · green card filings: 31","filings_12m":74,"filings_prev_12m":77,"green_card_filings_12m":31,"median_offered_wage_usd":134690,"route":null,"cap_exempt":false,"checked_at":"2026-10-29T16:27:21+00:00","sources":["US Department of Labor: LCA disclosure data (H-1B, H-1B1, E-3)","US Department of Labor: PERM disclosure data (green cards)"],"filings_for_role_12m":22}],"liveness":{"score":8,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":1,"p_active":0.3,"p_room":0.28,"age_days":136,"expected_fill_days":42,"reasons":["conf:3","repost:2","stale_co","velocity","ghost","win:tail","crowd:brand"],"computed_at":"2026-10-31T05:58:55Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":274700,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/natera-principal-software-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/natera-principal-software-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-31T13:56:43Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":21627,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-01T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":3078},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=3078"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fnatera-principal-software-engineer"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fnatera-principal-software-engineer"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fnatera-principal-software-engineer"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/natera-principal-software-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fnatera-principal-software-engineer"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":8757}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"natera.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":8757},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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