This role is ideal for a seasoned engineering leader with a heavy background in high-throughput, low-latency infrastructure. You should have at least 8 years of
Work type: hybrid
Location: Hybrid - San Francisco
Salary: $196,000 – $336,000/yr
Type: Full-time
This role is ideal for a seasoned engineering leader with a heavy background in high-throughput, low-latency infrastructure. You should have at least 8 years of experience in large-scale distributed systems and at least 3 years in management. The team is looking for someone who speaks the language of HTTP, TLS, and caching strategies, but prioritizes people leadership, roadmap alignment, and operational excellence over individual coding. The compensation is highly competitive, reaching up to $336k (location-dependent) plus equity. The role offers excellent flexibility with a remote-first approach and a WFH budget. You’ll be managing a "tier zero" service for one of the most influential companies in the modern web ecosystem, offering massive scale and the opportunity to influence the performance of millions of sites. **You might be a good fit if you...** * Have deep technical expertise in CDN architectures, proxies, or edge computing. * Excel at translating high-level business goals into actionable engineering roadmaps. * Have a track record of fostering high-autonomy teams through candid feedback and psychological safety. * Are comfortable navigating technical conflicts and making final decisions on complex infrastructure trade-offs.
## About Vercel:
Vercel gives developers the tools and cloud infrastructure to build, scale, and secure a faster, more personalized web. As the team behind v0, Next.js, and AI SDK, Vercel helps customers like Ramp, Supreme, PayPal, and Under Armour build for the AI-native web.
Our mission is to enable the world to ship the best products. That starts with creating a place where everyone can do their best work. Whether you're building on our platform, supporting our customers, or shaping our story: You can just ship things.
## About the Role:
You’ll lead the team responsible for Vercel’s CDN, proxy, and edge caching systems—the core infrastructure that powers performance, reliability, and cost efficiency for every customer request at Vercel. Your mandate is twofold: Operate critical systems exceptionally (latency, reliability, COGS), and align the team to product and business goals, translating strategy into a clear roadmap
You will set direction, grow people, and create the conditions for high trust, high autonomy, and high output—balancing technical depth with strong people leadership. This is a manager role, not a principal IC role. You’ll code when it’s the highest leverage (e.g., prototypes/unblocking), but your default is delegation, coaching, and alignment.
## About You: