Principal Software Engineer

typeface
Palo Alto, CAFull-time$247,500–$267,000Posted Sep 2, 2026

About the role

About Typeface

We help the world’s biggest brands move from brief to fully personalized campaigns — in days, not months.

Founded by Abhay Parasnis and backed by Microsoft, GV, Salesforce, Lightspeed, Madrona and Menlo, we’re building category-defining technology at the intersection of creativity and AI with real impact. Join us to help shape the future of enterprise marketing.

What You’ll Do

As a Principal Engineer, you will:

Solve complex architectural challenges to harness the power of LLMs and multimodal AI for scalable, enterprise-grade content generation.

Lead cross-functional technical initiatives spanning multiple teams and product areas.

Partner with enterprise customers to deeply understand their challenges and translate them into robust, high-impact solutions.

Mentor and guide engineers across the organization, raising the bar for technical excellence.

Advocate for best-in-class engineering practices, ensuring security, scalability, and maintainability across the platform.

How You'll Make an Impact

Architectural Leadership:

Define and evolve the architecture for AI-driven, multimodal content personalization.

Evaluate and integrate cutting-edge AI technologies, optimizing for cost, latency, and output quality.

Cross-Company Impact:

Spearhead engineering initiatives that address critical business priorities.

Translate complex enterprise customer requirements into practical, scalable solutions.

Mentorship & Advocacy:

Coach engineers in AI/ML systems, distributed architectures, and multimodal generation pipelines.

Champion engineering best practices — from code quality to CI/CD, observability, and security.

Execution Excellence:

Contribute hands-on to code and design when needed.

Ensure solutions meet enterprise-grade standards for security, reliability, and compliance.

What You Bring

10+ years in software engineering, with at least 3+ years in a principal/staff-level IC role.

Master’s or PhD degree in Computer Science or a related field

Proven experience architecting distributed systems, AI/ML platforms, or large-scale SaaS applications.

Strong background in cloud-native architecture (AWS, GCP, Azure), containerization (Docker, Kubernetes), and modern API design.

Track record of influencing technical direction across multiple teams.

Excellent communication skills for both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Expertise in LLMs (prompt engineering, fine-tuning, inference) and multimodal AI (text, image, video, audio)

In your first 3 months, you will:

Shape the architecture for the next generation of AI-driven, multimodal content solutions.

Drive engineering excellence and raise the company-wide technical bar.

Deliver solutions that directly address critical enterprise customer needs.

Mentor engineers into senior technical leadership roles.

Location

This is a hybrid role based in either our Palo Alto office. We collaborate in-office 3 days a week.

Base Salary

The range for this role is $247,500-$267,000. Actual compensation may vary based on level, experience, and skillset as assessed in the interview process.

Benefits

Competitive compensation — including salary, equity, and 401(k)

Full medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family

HSA and FSA options to support your financial wellness

Flexible time off — including parental leave

Well-being programs — resources to support your mental and physical health

Daily lunch & snacks

Mentorship & impact — work closely with top AI leaders on products that ship

Equality Opportunity Statement

We welcome and encourage applicants from all backgrounds. Employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, disability, medical condition, veteran status, or any other legally protected status. We comply with applicable laws in every jurisdiction where we operate.

Why You’ll Love Working Here

Build something big — Be part of a fast-growing startup defining a new category: marketing orchestration powered by Agentic AI.

Your work will matter — Trusted by Fortune 100 companies, our platform delivers 10x content velocity and 90% faster campaigns.

A+ team — Collaborate with veterans from Meta, Amazon, Adobe, Google, Microsoft, and top AI companies.

Backed by the best — GV, Salesforce Ventures, Microsoft, Lightspeed, Madrona and Menlo ($165M raised).

Recognized for innovation — TIME Best Inventions, Fast Company Next Big Thing in Tech, Gartner Cool Vendor, Adweek AI Company of the Year, LinkedIn Top Startup, Webby Award (AI Work & Productivity).

Responsibilities

  • Solve complex architectural challenges for scalable content generation
  • Lead cross-functional technical initiatives
  • Partner with enterprise customers to understand their challenges
  • Mentor and guide engineers across the organization
  • Advocate for best engineering practices

Qualifications

  • 10+ years in software engineering
  • At least 3+ years in a principal/staff-level IC role
  • Master’s or PhD in Computer Science or related field
  • Experience architecting distributed systems or large-scale SaaS applications
  • Strong background in cloud-native architecture and modern API design

Benefits

  • Competitive compensation including salary, equity, and 401(k)
  • Full medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family
  • HSA and FSA options
  • Flexible time off including parental leave
  • Well-being programs
  • Daily lunch & snacks
  • Mentorship opportunities

Skills mentioned

System DesignDistributed SystemsREST APIsCloud ComputingDockerKubernetesGenerative AILarge Language ModelsPrompt EngineeringFine-Tuning

About typeface

Typeface is the marketing orchestration engine that unifies Marketing, Creative, and IT teams to power the entire content lifecycle. By moving beyond one-off generation to enterprise-grade orchestration, Typeface provides a single pane of glass to conduct people, agents, and systems across every channel—all grounded in rich enterprise context and brand standards. Built for large organizations, the platform combines shared brand intelligence and governed agent workflows with deep enterprise integration. It connects seamlessly with platforms like Salesforce, Microsoft, and Google to help teams scale what works without sacrificing quality or control. Our platform is built on four core pillars: Arc Graph: A living context graph that connects brand standards and assets into a unified intelligence layer. Arc Forge: IT-powered architecture for designing and deploying governed, scalable agents via MCP, APIs, and webhooks. Arc Agents: Purpose-built marketing agents for email, social, paid media, web, and video. Arc Spaces: A collaborative, visual workspace where teams and agents plan, build, and run campaigns together. Trusted by Fortune 500 companies and global brands like ASICS and Johnson Controls, Typeface enables organizations to operationalize AI inside real marketing workflows. This turns brand standards, approvals, and performance signals into coordinated systems that improve over time. Typeface turns AI experimentation into repeatable, business-critical workflows. Anything imagined. Everything on-brand. Scaled with Typeface.

Software Development51-200 employeesPalo Alto, CA