Staff Software Engineer, Identity & Access - AI Platform

Redpanda is the first runtime and control plane for agent-data interaction — a unified platform that combines streaming, SQL analytics, and intelligent connectivity with the governance layer enterprise AI agents need in production.

Built on infrastructure already trusted by Fortune 500 companies and fast-growing startups, Redpanda enforces governance entirely outside the agent’s data path, controlling what agents see, limiting what they do, and capturing a tamper-proof record of everything they touch, so organizations never have to choose between innovation and control.

About the Role:

Identity is one of the two gates every enterprise puts in front of agentic AI before it touches production data — alongside observability, it is what turns a compelling demo into something a security team will actually approve. We already ship a per-data-plane OAuth 2.1 authorization server and token vault, delegated tool access, and support for external agent clients (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Copilot Studio) connecting in through governed paths. What comes next — how an agent acts on behalf of a human or another agent, how that delegation is proven and audited rather than assumed, and how Redpanda’s identity model federates with (rather than replaces) a customer’s existing IdP — is still being actively defined, inside Redpanda and across the industry. Standards for agent identity, delegated authorization, and on-behalf-of (OBO) access patterns are moving fast and are genuinely unsettled: this is a domain where the right technical bet made now becomes a durable competitive advantage, and the wrong one becomes years of migration pain.

We’re looking for a Staff Software Engineer to own that direction end to end — AuthN, AuthZ, and OBO for agents — as a charter that spans both Agentic Data Plane and the Cloud platform it runs on. This is a high-autonomy, high-influence individual contributor role: you will set the technical bet Redpanda makes on an evolving landscape, then roll up your sleeves and build it, not just architect it and hand it off.

You are:

• A recognized technical authority on identity, access, and delegation systems, comfortable being the person in the room who has to make the call when the industry itself hasn’t converged yet
• Excited to roll up your sleeves and do what it takes to deliver objective results — this role designs, builds, and ships, it does not stop at the design doc
• Able to lead through influence rather than authority — your charter spans both Agentic Data Plane and the Cloud platform team, and on the Cloud platform side you will be driving technical direction with no reporting relationship to lean on
• Eager to thrive with the thrill and ethos of a fast growing startup
• Accountable, bring a sense of ownership, and are self-driven

You have:

• 10+ years of experience in software development and delivery, with deep, hands-on expertise in authentication, authorization, or identity systems specifically
• Production experience with OAuth 2.0/2.1, OIDC, token exchange or delegation patterns (e.g. RFC 8693, on-behalf-of flows), and the practical tradeoffs of running an authorization server and token vault at scale
• A strong, current point of view on where agent identity standards are heading — MCP auth, A2A, cross-app access patterns (e.g. Okta XAA, Entra Agent ID, Auth0 for AI Agents) — and the judgment to bet on a direction before the market fully settles
• Experience designing systems that must federate with, rather than replace, a customer’s existing identity provider (Okta, Entra, Ping, or similar) in security-conscious enterprise environments
• A track record of driving technical direction across multiple teams or orgs as an individual contributor — through design docs, RFCs, code, and direct influence, including with teams outside your own reporting chain
• Comfortable working with a globally distributed engineering team, collaborating on GitHub, in the open, and a self starter
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain identity and delegation tradeoffs to engineers, security teams, and customers who may not share your specialist vocabulary

You will:

• Own the technical direction for AuthN, AuthZ, and OBO across Agentic Data Platform and the Cloud platform — deciding which emerging industry patterns Redpanda adopts, adapts, or deliberately avoids
• Design and build the systems yourself: extending the OAuth 2.1 authorization ser…