Principal Software Engineer

About the role

Overview Microsoft Silicon, Cloud Hardware, and Infrastructure Engineering (SCHIE) is the team behind Microsoft’s expanding Cloud Infrastructure and responsible for powering Microsoft’s “Intelligent Cloud” mission. SCHIE delivers the core infrastructure and foundational technologies for Microsoft's over 200 online businesses including Bing, MSN, Office 365, Xbox Live, Teams, OneDrive, and the Microsoft Azure platform globally with our server and data center infrastructure, security and compliance, operations, globalization, and manageability solutions. Our focus is on smart growth, high efficiency, and delivering a trusted experience to customers and partners worldwide and we are looking for engineers to help achieve that mission. Are you passionate about building the next generation of Azure and AI infrastructure at hyperscale? Do you thrive in an environment that embraces innovation, technical excellence, and a growth mindset? The Firmware Center of Excellence (FW CoE) is responsible for the hardware, firmware, and platform software stack that powers Azure's global infrastructure. We are seeking a Principal Software Engineer to architect and deliver highly scalable cloud services that enable firmware lifecycle management across multiple generations of Azure hardware platforms, diverse SKU portfolios, and a broad range of firmware technologies. These services distribute critical updates to millions of servers worldwide while meeting the highest standards for reliability, security, fleet health, and operational excellence. In this role, you will lead complex, high-impact initiatives across Azure Infrastructure, AI, Hardware, Firmware, and Datacenter organizations, driving technical strategy, cross-organizational alignment, and execution. You will solve challenging distributed systems and platform engineering problems, advancing intelligent automation for firmware deployment, infrastructure reliability, service healing, and node remediation workflows. Leveraging AI-driven insights and cloud-scale automation, you will influence the future of firmware management and autonomous infrastructure operations across Azure's global fleet. The ideal candidate has a proven track record of leading end-to-end product development, navigating ambiguity, driving broad collaboration, and delivering innovative solutions that have Azure-wide impact.

Responsibilities Responsibilities: Design, build, and operate intelligent cloud services that power firmware lifecycle management, fleet health, and platform reliability across Azure’s global infrastructure. Lead the development of AI-driven and autonomous platform capabilities that improve deployment orchestration, firmware compliance, predictive maintenance, and infrastructure remediation at hyperscale. Drive complex, cross-organizational initiatives across Azure Infrastructure, AI, Hardware, Firmware, and Datacenter Operations teams to deliver innovative platform solutions. Architect scalable systems that leverage telemetry, machine learning, and automation to proactively detect, diagnose, and remediate out-of-service nodes and infrastructure health issues. Solve challenging distributed systems and cloud-scale engineering problems while advancing operational excellence, reliability, and efficiency across diverse hardware generations, SKUs, and firmware technologies. Provide technical leadership and influence Azure-wide engineering strategy through innovation, execution excellence, and collaboration across multiple organizations.