Sr Principal Engineer Software

About this role

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: Relocation assistance may be available

CLEARANCE REQUIRED FOR START: No

CLEARANCE TYPE: Top Secret

TRAVEL: Yes, 10% of the Time Description

At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.

Northrop Grumman’s Aeronautics Systems – Research & Advanced Design (R&AD) transforms breakthrough ideas into mission-ready capabilities through intelligent anticipation. We’re the front-end design engine, defining what comes next. From developing cutting-edge next-generation future aircraft to trailblazing collaborative autonomous platforms, we push the boundaries of technology and forge industry-leading partnerships that set new standards for what’s possible.

Our team owns the full lifecycle of advanced concept creation, from visionary early-stage designs and rapid prototyping to high-impact demonstrations and solving the toughest technical challenges in survivability, autonomy, and battle management. We seek curious, adaptable people who thrive on turning intuition into breakthrough solutions. If you’re driven to invent the future, build what’s next, and shape the landscape of national security, this is where you belong.

Northrop Grumman Aeronautics Systems Sector is searching for a Senior Principal Software Engineer to join the Research and Advanced Development division working on exciting new next generation technologies. This position can be located in either San Diego, C A or El Segundo, CA .

Responsibilities: • Engineer enterprise solutions that align with best practices to support mission critical objectives.

• Work on 1-3 mid- to large-scale projects concurrently, assigned from program and internal leadership.

• Participate in regular project design and incremental status meetings.

• Collaborate with different teams across the program to discuss, analyze or resolve usability issues and work on projects.

• Provide effective communication across multi-functional teams, stakeholders and end-users.

Basic Qualifications: • Bachelor’s Degree in Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics (STEM) from an accredited university and at least 9 years’ relevant experience, or STEM master’s degree with 7 years’ relevant experience, or a STEM PHD with 3 years’ relevant experience

• Your ability to transfer and maintain the final adjudicated Top Secret clearance (DoD must be in-scope or enrolled in Continuous Evaluation) and any program access(es) required for the position within a reasonable period of time, as determined by the Company.

• Enterprise Integration Patterns (EIP): Proficiency with Spring Integration or Apache Camel to build robust adapters and message routers.

• Java 21+ Proficiency, microservice development and front-end interfaces

• Experience with Observability technologies, health indicators, and dashboarding including Prometheus and Grafana

• Experience with Apache Niagara Files (NiFi)

• Deep knowledge of data flow technologies and networking, including UDP, TCP, and hybrid protocols

• Hybrid S3 Integration: Ability to develop in Java 21+ using the AWS SDK for Java v2 for scenarios where a standalone microservice is more performant than a NiFi processor.

• Dashboard Development: Backend: Java 21+/Spring Boot service with a time-series or document-oriented store (e.g., MongoDB or Elasticsearch) for status history. Frontend: Proficiency in Angular, React or Vue.js to build the custom "web app" for status display.

• Real-time Updates: Implementation of WebSockets (via Spring WebSocket) or Server-Sent Events (SSE) to push prober status changes to the dashboard instantly.

Preferred Qualifications: • Active SCI and SAP security clearance.

• Java 21+ Mastery: Leverage Virtual Threads (Project Loom) for high-concurrency probing and file processing tasks.

• Protocol Translation: Deep experience with Protobuf (Google Protocol Buffers), JAXB/Jackson for XML (UCI) processing, and JSON schema validation.

• Asynchronous Messaging: Mastery of JMS (Java Message Service) specifically with ActiveMQ Classic. Candidates should understand connection pooling, message persistence, and dead-letter queue (DLQ) management.

• Resiliency Patterns: Implementation of Circuit Breakers (e.g., Resilience4j) to handle "Relay" failures without cascading into the main effort.

• Data Pipeline Orchestration: Advanced knowledge of Apache NiFi. Looking for ability to design custom FlowFiles, use ListS3/FetchS3, and implement complex routing logic.

• Containerization: Proficiency in Docker/OCI image optimization and deploying standalone Spring Boot apps in resource-constrained environments.

• Testing: Mastery of Testcontainers for local integration testing of S3 (LocalStack) and ActiveMQ brokers.

• Stream Processing: Familiarity with Project Reactor or Java Streams to process large file metadata efficiently without memory overflows.

• Custom Observability: Experience extending Spring Boot Actuator to expose non-standard health indicators and custom metrics via Micrometer.

• Schema-Driven Monitoring: Ability to design Avro or Protobuf schemas for transmitting custom observability data to ensure cross-org compatibility.

Primary Level Salary Range: $142,200.00 - $213,400.00

The above salary range represents a general guideline; however, Northr

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