Build and Release Engineer (DevOps)

The role

You will own the build system, CI pipelines, test harness integrations, and developer environments. You will work within the Platform team to support FPGA, embedded, DSP, cloud, and ground teams.

What you will do

• Own the build system including reproducibility, caching, build times, and cross-platform targets
• Design and maintain reusable GitLab CI templates and pipeline components
• Build reproducible developer environments
• Implement release automation and promotion mechanics from development through production
• Instrument the build and CI system and publish developer productivity metrics
• Support engineers on build and pipeline issues

Required qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience
• 3+ years of experience in build engineering, DevOps, CI/CD, developer productivity, or platform engineering
• Hands-on experience owning CI pipelines (GitLab CI, GitHub Actions, Buildkite, or similar) for a multi-team codebase
• Proficiency in Python and shell scripting
• Ability to read and build Rust or C/C++ projects
• Solid understanding of containers, Linux, and Git workflows
• Demonstrated ability to diagnose and fix slow or unreliable builds

Nice to have

• Production experience with Nix, OCI, and hermetic build systems
• Experience with cross-compilation and embedded or FPGA toolchains
• Experience with remote build caching and distributed builds
• Familiarity with software supply chain security tooling, SAST, DAST, and SBOMs
• Exposure to Kubernetes, ArgoCD, or GitOps deployment patterns
• Experience in a regulated environment (CMMC, NIST 800-171, or similar) where build provenance matters

About the company

Northwood is a modern space infrastructure company building a global network of phased array and parabolic ground stations. They design, build, and deploy scalable systems for satellite missions.