Principal DevOps Engineer (Cortex)

Company Description

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission:

Being the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life.

Our vision is a world where each day is safer and more secure than the one before. We are a company built on the foundation of challenging and disrupting the way things are done, and we’re looking for innovators who are as committed to shaping the future of cybersecurity as we are.

Who We Are

We take our mission of protecting the digital way of life seriously. We are relentless in protecting our customers and we believe that the unique ideas of every member of our team contributes to our collective success. Our values were crowdsourced by employees and are brought to life through each of us everyday - from disruptive innovation and collaboration, to execution. From showing up for each other with integrity to creating an environment where we all feel included.

As a member of our team, you will be shaping the future of cybersecurity. We work fast, value ongoing learning, and we respect each employee as a unique individual. Knowing we all have different needs, our development and personal wellbeing programs are designed to give you choice in how you are supported. This includes our FLEXBenefits wellbeing spending account with over 1,000 eligible items selected by employees, our mental and financial health resources, and our personalized learning opportunities - just to name a few!

At Palo Alto Networks, we believe in the power of collaboration and value in-person interactions. This is why our employees generally work full time from our office with flexibility offered where needed. This setup fosters casual conversations, problem-solving, and trusted relationships. Our goal is to create an environment where we all win with precision.

Job Description

NOTE: Due to government environments this team supports, the role requires a US Citizen or Permanent Resident.

Your Career

The Cortex team builds and delivers the industry’s most advanced SecOps platform, consisting of XSIAM, XSOAR, and XPANSE. As a Senior DevOps Engineer, you will be responsible for designing, building, and maintaining the infrastructure and automation that powers our large-scale cloud platform. You will work closely with engineering teams to enable fast and reliable software delivery, optimize system performance, and ensure seamless scalability.

This role requires a strong DevOps engineer who is passionate about automation, cloud infrastructure, observability, and continuous integration/deployment. You will contribute to the evolution of our infrastructure by implementing best practices in configuration management, cloud provisioning, containerization, and CI/CD pipelines.

Your Impact

• Cloud Infrastructure – Architect, deploy, and manage cloud-native solutions in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) to ensure scalability, reliability, and performance
• Automation & Infrastructure as Code – Develop Infrastructure-as-Code using Terraform, automate configuration management with tools like Ansible, and drive adoption of GitOps practices
• CI/CD Pipelines – Build, maintain, and optimize CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins, GitLab CI, or similar tools to enable rapid, reliable software delivery
• Containerization & Orchestration – Deploy and manage containerized workloads using Kubernetes (GKE preferred) and Docker, ensuring resilience and security
• Monitoring & Performance Optimization – Implement monitoring, logging, and alerting solutions to proactively identify and resolve performance issues
• Security & Compliance – Ensure security best practices are followed across infrastructure, networking, and application deployment
• Collaboration – Work closely with development teams to integrate DevOps practices, troubleshoot production issues, and improve operational efficiency
• On-Call Rotation – Participate in on-call support to maintain platform reliability and resolve production incidents

Qualifications

Your Experience

• 5+ years of experience in DevOps, Site Reliability Engineering, or Cloud Infrastructure roles
• BS or MS in Computer Science or related technical field
• Strong cloud expertise in Google Cloud Platform (preferred) or AWS
• Infrastructure as Code – Deep knowledge of Terraform, Ansible, or equivalent tools
• Proficiency in scripting/programming with Python, Go, or Bash
• Containerization & Kubernetes – Experience managing large-scale Kubernetes environments and deploying workloads in GKE, EKS, or similar
• CI/CD & Automation – Hands-on experience with CI/CD tools such as Jenkins, GitLab CI, or ArgoCD
• Linux Administration – Strong knowledge of Linux systems and shell scripting
• Networking & Security – Understanding of cloud networking, IAM, firewalls, and security best practices
• Experience troubleshooting production issues in high-scale environments
• Excellent problem-solving skills and ability to work in a fast-paced, collaborative environment

Additional Information

The Team

Our DevOps team is at the core of Cortex’s cloud infrastructure, enabling our engineering teams to build and deploy software at scale. We thrive on automation, efficiency, and reliability, always pushing the boundaries of DevOps excellence.

If you’re excited about building scalable infrastructure, improving deployment workflows, and driving DevOps culture, we want to hear from you.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/commissioned roles) is expected to be between $147000/YR - $237500/YR. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here .

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Our Commitment

We’re problem solvers that take risks and challenge cybersecurity’s status quo. It’s simple: we can’t accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at [email protected] .

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.