Principal Software Engineer - Cloud Access Security Broker, Application Visibility and Control
About the job
- A bachelor's degree in computer science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
- Typically, 12 or more years of software engineering experience, including architecture and technical leadership across multiple teams.
- Direct experience with Cloud Access Security Broker, Application Visibility and Control, Secure Service Edge/Secure Access Service Edge, Secure Web Gateway, Data Loss Prevention, malware protection, or SaaS tenant security.
- Experience building application-discovery, traffic-classification, application-intelligence, or high-volume telemetry systems.
- Demonstrated experience designing and operating large-scale, cloud-native distributed systems.
- Experience architecting or integrating artificial intelligence or machine-learning capabilities into production products or engineering workflows.
- A strong background in cloud-delivered web, SaaS, network, or data security, with an understanding of policy enforcement and data protection.
- Proven ability to remain hands-on while influencing senior stakeholders, guiding complex designs, and mentoring experienced engineers.
- Shape technical direction at the intersection of artificial intelligence, application intelligence, SaaS security, and cloud-scale architecture.
- Define the architecture and roadmap for core Cloud Access Security Broker and Application Visibility and Control capabilities that help enterprises gain visibility, enforce granular application policies, and protect data across SaaS and AI-driven environments.
- Lead the transformation of application discovery and classification through AI-assisted intelligence, improving automation, accuracy, data freshness, and the speed of identifying new applications and threats.
- Help embed responsible artificial intelligence across the product development lifecycle, using AI to accelerate engineering productivity, quality, testing, troubleshooting, and delivery.
- Lead architecture and technical direction for Cloud Access Security Broker and Application Visibility and Control capabilities within Cisco Secure Access.
- Define architecture and roadmap for application discovery, granular application controls, SaaS tenant controls, and offline or API-based Data Loss Prevention and malware scanning of SaaS content.
- Lead broader use of artificial intelligence in the product, including AI-powered security capabilities, controls for generative AI applications, and responsible AI use across the product development lifecycle.
- Own technical strategy for the internal CASI application-intelligence platform, including data quality, confidence scoring, human validation, model monitoring, update speed, and scaling with traffic and application growth; lead AI-assisted transformation of application discovery and classification.
- Guide critical feature designs and establish foundations for security, privacy, performance, scalability, resilience, observability, quality, troubleshooting, and cost efficiency.
- Translate customer needs, emerging threats, and product priorities into scalable capabilities in partnership with product management, security research, architects, and engineering teams.
- Provide cross-team technical leadership and mentorship, resolve complex architectural issues, and raise engineering standards without becoming a design-review bottleneck.
- A master's degree or PhD in Computer Science, Cybersecurity, Machine Learning, or a related field.
- Experience with AI-based classification, human-in-the-loop workflows, model evaluation, monitoring, and MLOps.
- Experience architecting global, multi-tenant services on AWS and resolving complex production or customer issues.
About the company
Cisco makes the switches and routers that connect offices, data centers, and cloud services, and it also sells cybersecurity tools and Webex video meetings to businesses and governments. It was one of the first companies to sell routers that let different kinds of computer networks exchange data, and in 2000 it briefly became the world's most valuable company. Customers run its network gear, from Wi-Fi access points to AI data center systems, with Cisco software that sets up and secures the network, while its Splunk unit searches computer logs to catch outages and attacks. Cisco earns money from hardware sales, software subscriptions, and support contracts. It was founded in 1984 and is based in San Jose, California.
Company Size
10,001+
Company Stage
IPO
Headquarters
San Jose, California
Founded
1984
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Simplify's Take
What believers are saying
- Cloud giants fuel growth: they ordered $9.3 billion of Cisco's AI gear in the year to July 2026, up 4.5-fold.
- Stock awards gained value: Cisco shares rose 63% in the year to October 2026, four times the S&P 500's 15%.
- Signed deals steady the business: Cisco had $46.7 billion of contracted sales still to deliver in July 2026, up 7%.
What critics are saying
- Record sales didn't stop layoffs: Cisco cut nearly 4,000 jobs, just under 5% of staff, in May 2026.
- Rivals lead in data center switches: in the June 2026 quarter, Nvidia held 20.4%, Arista 18.7% and Cisco 18.2%.
- Hardware-heavy AI growth squeezes profit: Cisco's gross margin fell to 66.3% from 68.4% in the July 2026 quarter.
What makes Cisco unique
- Cisco still sells the most network switches: it took 28.7% of worldwide switch sales in the June 2026 quarter.
- Cisco designs its own networking chips: Microsoft and Alibaba signed on early for its Silicon One P200, launched October 2025.
- Cisco trains future network engineers: its Networking Academy has taught over 28 million learners in 195 countries since 1997.
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Benefits
- Paid Vacation
- Hybrid Work Options
- Flexible Work Hours
- Professional Development Budget
Growth & Insights and Company News
6 month growth
-1%1 year growth
0%2 year growth
0%Cisco Systems and NVIDIA have announced a collaboration to bring 400G optical technology to AI data centres. The partners plan to commercialise a new ultra small form factor pluggable (USFP) standard designed to quadruple bandwidth density. The companies aim to build an open hardware ecosystem with other optical and networking vendors, including TE Connectivity and Amphenol, to support large AI workloads. The move targets the wiring bottleneck that could cap AI infrastructure spending. Cisco, which has a market capitalisation of about $453.7b, faces competition from Arista and Juniper in AI networking, and analysts flag hardware mix and memory costs as a margin risk.
With the Buffett indicator near 237%, a Simply Wall St screen points to three large companies it considers high-quality value stocks: Cisco Systems, General Mills, and Coca-Cola. Cisco generates about $63.3 billion from networking products and has a market value of roughly $454.7 billion. Its AI infrastructure orders outlook for fiscal 2026 has risen to about $9 billion, driven by demand from cloud providers. General Mills has a market value near $17.5 billion, with $10.4 billion of sales from North America Retail. It plans $750 million of cost savings in fiscal 2027 as part of a $3 billion programme through fiscal 2030. Coca-Cola generates about $50.1 billion from nonalcoholic drinks and is valued near $386.3 billion. Its zero-sugar variants grew by double digits. The screen found 28 more companies with similar traits.
Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) has added AI agents to Webex that keep working on tasks after a conversation ends. Its shares traded at $114.52 on October 12, down about 3.3%. The agents use a tool called Dialog, which links customer history, company data, and backend systems so they can pursue unresolved requests. Claude integration is planned. Splunk tracks agent activity, and Cisco AI Defense provides safeguards. Shares sit 52.15% above the $75.27 GF Value estimate from GuruFocus. Cisco must turn the agents into higher recurring revenue without letting implementation costs and human supervision erode the gains.
NVIDIA and Cisco announced Ultra-Dense Small Form Factor Pluggable (USFP), a new optical module for AI data centres, on October 12, 2026. They say it will be the first to support 400Gb/s-per-lane electrical signals, for capacity up to 12.8Tb/s. USFP offers 4x the bandwidth density and about 1.3x the power efficiency of 200Gb/s-per-lane modules. Operators can connect more computing systems without adding network tiers, while cutting networking's share of power use. The first transceivers will pack 16 full-duplex lanes in an octal small form factor-sized footprint, with 32 lanes or more planned. The companies are working with TE Connectivity and Amphenol on cages, connectors and modules. They plan an open industry specification through a community-led multi-source project.
Cisco unveiled new chips, systems and optics for AI networks at the Open Compute Project Global Summit on October 12, 2026. With NVIDIA, it plans to create an open specification for Ultra-Dense Small Form Factor Pluggable (USFP), a 400Gb/s-per-lane optical module. Cisco says USFP should deliver 4x the bandwidth density and 1.3x the power efficiency of 200Gb/s-per-lane optics. Microsoft and Alibaba have put systems powered by Cisco's 51.2T Silicon One P200 into production. The first systems using the 102.4T G300 chip are shipping to customers. Cisco also introduced the 51.2T G302 chip for top-of-rack switches, which it plans to ship before the end of 2026. Its Live Protect security feature for SONiC customers starts in mid-2027.