The Guts to Try

Discover our network of startups committed to solving tough problems
in government, national security, and defense.

Engineering Manager - Data Platform and Infrastructure

EpiSci

EpiSci

Software Engineering, Other Engineering
Sunnyvale, CA, USA
USD 65k-400k / year + Equity
Posted on Mar 31, 2026

About Applied Intuition

Applied Intuition, Inc. is powering the future of physical AI. Founded in 2017 and now valued at $15 billion, the Silicon Valley company is creating the digital infrastructure needed to bring intelligence to every moving machine on the planet. Applied Intuition services the automotive, defense, trucking, construction, mining and agriculture industries in three core areas: tools and infrastructure, operating systems, and autonomy. Eighteen of the top 20 global automakers, as well as the United States military and its allies, trust the company’s solutions to deliver physical intelligence. Applied Intuition is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, with offices in Washington, D.C.; San Diego; Ft. Walton Beach, Florida; Ann Arbor, Michigan; London; Stuttgart; Munich; Stockholm; Bangalore; Seoul; and Tokyo. Learn more at applied.co.

We are an in-office company, and our expectation is that employees primarily work from their Applied Intuition office 5 days a week. However, we also recognize the importance of flexibility and trust our employees to manage their schedules responsibly. This may include occasional remote work, starting the day with morning meetings from home before heading to the office, or leaving earlier when needed to accommodate family commitments.

About the role

We are looking for an Engineering Manager to lead our Data Platform team within the Data Engineering group. In this role, you will manage a world class data engineering team responsible for the full data lifecycle — from collection and ingestion to storage, querying, and retrieval — at hundreds of PBs scale.

You will partner closely with all business units across Applied Intuition to define the technical roadmap for our data platform and ensure we can reliably support both external products and internal tooling across cloud, hybrid, and on-prem deployments. This is a highly cross-functional leadership role that requires deep technical credibility, strong people management skills, and a bias for ownership. At Applied Intuition, engineering managers are expected to be hands-on leaders who actively engage in technical direction, not just people management.

At Applied Intuition, you will:

  • Lead, grow, and mentor a team of data infrastructure engineers, fostering a culture of technical excellence, ownership, and collaboration
  • Define and drive the technical roadmap for data infrastructure, balancing short-term delivery with long-term scalability
  • Partner with engineering, product, and business unit leaders to align data infrastructure investments with company priorities
  • Own the architecture and reliability of systems that handle the full data lifecycle across all deployment environments (cloud, hybrid, on-prem) and regions
  • Drive engineering decisions around scalable data ingestion, indexing, storage, and retrieval for high-volume autonomous vehicle and physical AI workloads
  • Champion the adoption of modern open-source data technologies and maintain a disciplined approach to build-vs-buy decisions
  • Establish and uphold engineering best practices, code quality standards, and operational excellence across the team
  • Recruit top engineering talent and build an inclusive, high-performing team

We’re looking for someone who has:

  • A Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or equivalent
  • 6+ years of professional software engineering experience, with 2+ years in an engineering management or tech lead role
  • Hands-on experience with large-scale open-source data technologies (Spark, Kafka, Hudi/Iceberg, Flyte, etc.)
  • A strong track record of leading teams that build and operate high-scale distributed data systems
  • Experience managing engineers across the full data lifecycle in a production environment
  • Deep understanding of containerization, cloud-native architectures, and modern software development workflows
  • Strong cross-functional communication skills and the ability to influence technical direction at a senior level

Nice to have:

  • Proficiency in modern programming languages (Python, C++, GoLang, Scala, etc.)
  • Experience with Kubernetes and infrastructure-as-code tooling
  • Background in enterprise software environments, including on-prem and hybrid deployments
  • Familiarity with data quality, data profiling, and data governance frameworks
  • Experience hiring and building data infrastructure teams from the ground up
  • Prior exposure to automotive, defense, robotics, or other physical AI domains

Compensation at Applied Intuition for eligible roles includes base salary, equity, and benefits. Base salary is a single component of the total compensation package, which may also include equity in the form of options and/or restricted stock units, comprehensive health, dental, vision, life and disability insurance coverage, 401k retirement benefits with employer match, learning and wellness stipends, and paid time off. Note that benefits are subject to change and may vary based on jurisdiction of employment.

Applied Intuition pay ranges reflect the minimum and maximum intended target base salary for new hire salaries for the position. The actual base salary offered to a successful candidate will additionally be influenced by a variety of factors including experience, credentials & certifications, educational attainment, skill level requirements, interview performance, and the level and scope of the position.

Please reference the job posting’s subtitle for where this position will be located. For pay transparency purposes, the base salary range for this full-time position in the location listed is: $65,000 - $400,000 USD annually.

Don’t meet every single requirement? If you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles.

Applied Intuition is an equal opportunity employer and federal contractor or subcontractor. Consequently, the parties agree that, as applicable, they will abide by the requirements of 41 CFR 60-1.4(a), 41 CFR 60-300.5(a) and 41 CFR 60-741.5(a) and that these laws are incorporated herein by reference. These regulations prohibit discrimination against qualified individuals based on their status as protected veterans or individuals with disabilities, and prohibit discrimination against all individuals based on their race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or national origin. These regulations require that covered prime contractors and subcontractors take affirmative action to employ and advance in employment individuals without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status or disability. The parties also agree that, as applicable, they will abide by the requirements of Executive Order 13496 (29 CFR Part 471, Appendix A to Subpart A), relating to the notice of employee rights under federal labor laws.