Lead Software Engineer- Data Engineer

Career Area:

Job Description:

Your Work Shapes the World at Caterpillar Inc.

When you join Caterpillar, you're joining a global team who cares not just about the work we do – but also about each other.  We are the makers, problem solvers, and future world builders who are creating stronger, more sustainable communities. We don't just talk about progress and innovation here – we make it happen, with our customers, where we work and live. Together, we are building a better world, so we can all enjoy living in it.

Software Engineering Lead – Data Platform

About the Role

We are seeking a highly skilled Software Engineering Lead – Data Platform to lead the development of Caterpillar’s next-generation Digital Manufacturing Data Platform. This platform enables large-scale data ingestion, transformation, and analytics across manufacturing, supply chain, and engineering ecosystems.

The ideal candidate will bring deep expertise in data engineering, large-scale data ingestion, AWS-based architectures, and Snowflake, along with strong leadership and software engineering discipline.

Key Responsibilities

• Leadership & Delivery

• Lead and mentor a team of data engineers and platform developers
• Drive Agile execution and ensure predictable, high-quality delivery
• Establish engineering best practices, code quality, and CI/CD standards

•  Data Platform & Architecture

• Architect scalable and secure data platforms on AWS
• Design robust data ingestion frameworks for batch and near real-time pipelines
• Define best practices in data modeling, governance, and metadata management

• Data Engineering & Ingestion

• Lead design and development of scalable ingestion pipelines (structured and unstructured data)
• Build and optimize Snowflake-based data platforms for performance and cost
• Enable ingestion of diverse sources (databases, APIs, files, streaming data)

•  Cloud & Platform Engineering

• Leverage AWS services (S3, Glue, Lambda, EMR, Redshift, etc.) for end-to-end pipelines
• Implement CI/CD pipelines using Azure DevOps / Jenkins
• Ensure system scalability, resiliency, and operational readiness

• Software Engineering Excellence

• Enforce software engineering principles (modular design, code quality, testing, version control)
• Drive automation and continuous improvement
• Promote reusable frameworks for ingestion and transformation

•  Stakeholder Collaboration

• Partner with product managers, SMEs, and business stakeholders
• Translate business needs into scalable data solutions

Must-Have Skills

• 10+ years of experience in Data Engineering / Data Platform roles
• Strong experience in AWS data ecosystem (S3, Glue, Lambda, EMR, Redshift)
• Deep expertise in Snowflake (architecture, optimization, data modeling)
• Strong programming skills in Python and SQL
• Extensive experience with data ingestion pipelines and ETL/ELT frameworks
• Exposure to real-time streaming (Kafka, Spark Streaming)
• Experience with CI/CD tools (GitHub, Jenkins, AWS CloudFormation etc.)
• Solid understanding of distributed systems and scalable architectures
• Strong foundation in software engineering principles (Git, testing, design patterns)
• Experienced in working with Agile teams
• Collaborate with Data Science and AI teams to operationalize ML models and analytics workflows.
• Promote integration of AI capabilities into data engineering pipelines (e.g., GenAI, MCP, ATA).
• Support real-time analytics and edge AI use cases in manufacturing environments.
• Use AI extensively in building and testing Data Ingestion and Data pipeline

Nice-to-Have Skills

• Experience with Graph Databases (Neo4j, Neptune)
• Experience with Vector Databases (Milvus, OpenSearch)
• Knowledge of NVIDIA ecosystem and RAPIDS (cuDF, cuML, cuGraph)
• Experience integrating AI/ML pipelines or GenAI workflows

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science / Engineering
• Proven track record in leading engineering teams and delivering at scale
• Strong leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills

Posting Dates:

Caterpillar is an Equal Opportunity Employer.  Qualified applicants of any age are encouraged to apply

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