---
title: 'Principal Cloud Software Engineer at Mainspring Energy'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/principal-cloud-software-engineer-mainspring-energy-menlo-park-z5f4sfhn7gjw'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-07'
---

# Principal Cloud Software Engineer at Mainspring Energy

- **Company:** Mainspring Energy
- **Location:** Menlo Park, CA
- **Compensation:** $210k–$247k
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-04-24
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-07
- **Apply:** https://jobs.lever.co/mainspringenergy/b442052c-9732-496b-997e-5f1c31cd96cd

## Job description

## About Mainspring

Mainspring Energy manufactures and delivers fuel-flexible, low-emissions local power solutions that rapidly add new capacity and deliver reliable, affordable, and sustainable electric power. The company began commercial shipments of its Mainspring Linear Generators in 2020 and today has hundreds of megawatts in advanced development and field operations for leading Fortune 500 companies, data centers, and utilities. Mainspring also partners with global energy leaders including AEP, NextEra Energy Resources, Schneider Electric, and more. The core values that ground our work, guide our decisions, and connect us together: Pragmatic Optimism Excellence without Ego Proactive Collaboration

Job Overview Mainspring Energy is reinventing distributed power generation with our Linear Generator; a fuel-flexible, ultra-low emissions platform delivering resilient, on-site power for commercial, industrial, and utility customers. We have a high-impact opportunity for a Principal Cloud Platform Software Engineer to join our world-class engineering team as we scale our global fleet.

In this role, you will be the lead architect owning the cloud-to-field software ecosystem that powers, monitors, and optimizes our distributed energy assets. This is a rare opportunity to unify cloud, data, and embedded device software under one technical vision. You will lead the team architecting industrial-grade, uptime-critical systems where software decisions directly impact physical infrastructure and global energy transition.

## Responsibilities

- Lead the team building high-speed systems to ingest and process real-time telemetry from thousands of remote assets
- Design and build the infrastructure for secure remote monitoring, diagnostics, and large-scale software updates (OTA) on embedded devices
- Architect distributed data systems (e.g., Snowflake, Spark) to generate actionable insights and autonomous fleet optimizations
- Drive a reliability-first culture, implementing systems and processes that ensure 99.99%+ uptime for critical power infrastructure
- Embed AI into engineering workflows and product architecture to drive measurable gains in developer productivity and system reliability
- Collaborate with embedded systems, hardware design, and operations teams to ensure software-to-hardware synergy and long-term fleet health

## Qualifications

- 15+ years in software engineering, with a proven track record of architectural leadership across multiple teams in high-stakes production environments
- Deep experience in Industrial IoT (IIoT), energy systems, industrial automation, or managing fleet-scale device platforms
- Deep experience architecting within AWS, GCP, or Azure environments, specifically for distributed systems and large-scale data platforms
- A "physics-first" systems thinker who understands the interplay between cloud software and high-availability hardware
- Expertise in distributed systems and data infrastructure (e.g., Spark, Snowflake, or equivalent high-throughput telemetry pipelines)
- Demonstrated success in leveraging AI/ML to drive developer productivity, predictive maintenance, and autonomous fleet management
- A fundamental commitment to uptime; you believe 99% isn't good enough for critical energy infrastructure
- Excellent communication skills with the ability to articulate complex technical visions to both internal engineering teams and executive stakeholders

Does your experience not meet all of our posted requirements? Studies have shown that some people are less likely to apply to positions unless they meet every listed requirement. At Mainspring, we are committed to building a diverse, inclusive, flexible, and collaborative environment, so if you want to help us transition the world to clean and affordable electricity, and don’t meet all posted requirements for a particular role, we’d still love to hear from you. Mainspring can sometimes be flexible enough to shift responsibilities for the right person, or otherwise identify open or upcoming roles that may better fit your professional background. In more traditional words, Mainspring Energy, Inc is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, or protected veteran status and will not be discriminated against on the basis of disability. This compensation and benefits information is based on Mainspring Energy's estimate as of the date of publication and may be modified in the future. We generally do not negotiate on salary once we have made an offer. The level of pay within the range will depend on a variety of job-related factors that may include location, relevant prior experience and/or education, or particular skills and expertise. New hires joining the company tend to be paid within the starting base pay range noted above, with opportunities to increase pay over time based on development of additional skills, competencies, and company-specific knowledge.

## About Mainspring Energy

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Mainspring Energy designs and manufactures fuel-flexible linear generators that provide low-emission, dispatchable onsite power for utilities, data centers, and industrial customers.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Series F)
- **Headquarters**: Menlo Park, California, United States
- **Founded**: 2010
- **Founders**: Shannon Miller

## Core Business
- Primary industry: Electric Power Generation
- Target customers: B2B – utilities, data center developers, enterprise, industrial
- Mission statement: "Redefining how local power is delivered to capacity constrained companies and communities" – enabling clean, reliable, and fuel-flexible power.

## Products & Services
- **[Linear Generator (LGen)]**: A flameless, fuel-flexible generator that converts gaseous fuels (natural gas, biogas, hydrogen, propane) into electricity with near-zero NOx emissions. Modular (0.25 MW per unit), fast-ramping (0-100% dispatchable), 46% electrical efficiency (LHV). Standardized 2.5 MW configuration (10 units). Suitable for grid-parallel or grid-independent operation, microgrids, and balancing renewables.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed (private company)
- **Key Metrics**: Annual revenue $117M (latest fiscal year); total funding $813M; 407 employees
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: General Catalyst (led Series F, 2025, $258M), Lightrock (led Series E, 2022, $140M), BloombergNEF (grant), and others.
- **Growth Signals**: Powering the largest U.S. EV truck charging depot; >1 GW of capacity trusted by Fortune 500 companies and utilities; headcount growing +3.4% YoY; job postings up +121.4% YoY (62 active openings); recently expanded into data center market.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Fuel Flexibility**: Single generator can seamlessly switch between natural gas, RNG, hydrogen, and propane without hardware retrofits.
- **Near-Zero Emissions**: <1.5 ppm NOx (0.05 lb/MWh) – meets stringent air quality standards.
- **Dispatchability**: 0-100% load following, grid-independent operation, capable of firming renewables.
- **Low Maintenance**: Only two moving parts, no oil changes, modular design reduces downtime.
- **High Efficiency**: 46% electrical efficiency (LHV) across all scales.
- **Fast Deployment**: Factory-built, skid-mounted units enable rapid installation.

## Strategic Focus
- Scaling manufacturing and deployment to meet growing demand from data centers and utilities.
- Advancing hydrogen and biogas compatibility to support long-term decarbonization.
- Expanding standardized 2.5 MW configurations to lower installed cost and accelerate timelines.
- Building a diverse, cross-disciplinary team to drive innovation in power generation.

## Why Work Here
- Culture of inclusion, respect, and collaboration across engineering, operations, and field teams.
- Emphasis on growth: "We invest in your growth because progress requires people who keep getting better."
- Hybrid/Remote options: headquarters in Menlo Park, manufacturing facilities, and remote field service roles.
- Active hiring across engineering (mechanical, electrical, software), operations, supply chain, and field service.
- Competitive salary ranges (e.g., Engineer ~$107k, Controls Engineer ~$109k, Manufacturing Engineer ~$91k) plus benefits.
- Diverse talent origins from Tesla, Stanford, Apple, SunPower, and other top clean energy companies.

## Sources
1. [mainspringenergy.com/company](https://www.mainspringenergy.com/company)
2. [mainspringenergy.com/careers](https://www.mainspringenergy.com/careers)
3. [jobs.lever.co/mainspringenergy](https://jobs.lever.co/mainspringenergy)
4. [linkedin.com/company/mainspringenergy](https://www.linkedin.com/company/mainspringenergy)
5. [mainspringenergy.com/product](https://www.mainspringenergy.com/product)

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