---
title: 'Senior Software Engineer, AI Gateway at Kong'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/senior-software-engineer-ai-gateway-kong-milan-axcc8bam3mp9'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-11-06'
---

# Senior Software Engineer, AI Gateway at Kong

- **Company:** [Kong](https://feeny.ai/companies/kong)
- **Location:** Milan, Italy
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-10-26
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-11-06
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/kong/6f71176e-70cb-4091-af05-67f876dc8292

## Job description

Are you ready to unlock intelligence? If you don’t think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

The Mission: The AI Gateway team is on a mission to build the central nervous system for the agentic era, enabling developers to securely and reliably connect, observe, and manage their AI and ML services at scale. We are architecting the foundational layer that will power the next generation of intelligent applications. Your work will directly impact developer delight and ensure our infrastructure is the most trusted path for AI traffic in the world.

What You’ll Do:

- Design, own, and lead the development of critical, high-performance components for Kong’s AI Gateway using Golang.
- Influence the technical roadmap and architecture, ensuring our systems are scalable, resilient, and prepared for future challenges.
- Architect solutions that prevent technical debt and maintain our commitment to 99.99% uptime and reliability.
- Mentor and guide other engineers on the team, fostering a culture of technical excellence and collaborative problem-solving.
- Drive best practices in testing, observability, and continuous integration/delivery within a complex, distributed environment.
- Collaborate cross-functionally with product management, SRE, and other engineering teams to deliver a world-class developer experience.
- Resolve complex technical issues and conduct deep-dives into system performance, identifying and addressing bottlenecks.

What You’ll Bring: The Toolkit

- Extensive professional experience building software in a systems language like Golang or Python.
- Deep understanding of distributed systems, microservice architectures, and API design principles.
- Proven experience with cloud-native technologies, including Kubernetes and Docker.
- Experience with or a strong interest in AI/ML infrastructure, such as LLM orchestration, vector databases, or model serving.
- Solid knowledge of networking fundamentals (TCP/IP, HTTP/2, gRPC).

The Kong DNA

- Ownership: You are a proactive problem-solver with a bias for action, taking full ownership of your work from concept to production.
- Urgency: You thrive in a fast-paced, high-growth environment, and you are driven to deliver results quickly and efficiently.
- Collaboration: You are an excellent communicator who works effectively with a globally distributed team to achieve shared goals.

Bonus Points:

- Contributions to open-source software projects.
- Experience with Nginx, Lua, or service mesh technologies.
- Familiarity with AI frameworks like LangChain, PyTorch, or TensorFlow.
- Prior experience building API gateways, developer platforms, or large-scale infrastructure-as-a-service products.

## #LI-EA1

About Kong: Kong Inc., the AI Connectivity Company, is building the connectivity layer of AI. Trusted by the Fortune 500® and AI-native startups alike, Kong’s unified API and AI platform enables organizations to secure, manage, accelerate, govern, and monetize the flow of intelligence across APIs and AI traffic — on any model, any cloud. For more information, visit [www.konghq.com](http://www.konghq.com).

## About Kong

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Kong provides a unified API and AI platform that connects, secures, and manages APIs, events, and AI agents for modern architectures.
- **Entity Type**: Private – Series E, post‑money valuation $2B (2023)
- **Headquarters**: San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founded**: 2017 (company formalized; roots as Mashape go back to 2009)
- **Founders**: Augusto “Aghi” Marietti (CEO) and Marco Palladino (CTO)

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: API management, AI connectivity, cloud infrastructure
- **Target customers**: B2B – enterprises, platform engineering teams, developers, and product managers building API‑driven or AI‑agent applications
- **Mission / Purpose**: To be the AI connectivity company – enabling organizations to connect, govern, and monetize APIs, events, and AI workloads at scale.

## Products & Services
- **[Kong Konnect](https://konghq.com/)**: Managed, unified API and AI platform covering the full lifecycle – design, test, publish, govern, monetize – across any cloud or environment. SaaS.
- **[Kong Gateway](https://konghq.com/)**: Open‑source (and enterprise) API gateway, the world’s most adopted, used for traffic management, security, and observability. Open‑source hybrid.
- **[Kong AI Gateway](https://konghq.com/)**: Extension for managing and securing AI traffic – token consumption, cost control, and agent governance. SaaS / add‑on.
- **[Kong Mesh](https://konghq.com/)**: Enterprise service mesh for Kubernetes and VMs (based on Kuma, donated to CNCF). Infrastructure.
- **[Insomnia](https://konghq.com/)**: API design and testing tool (acquired and integrated into the Kong ecosystem). Desktop / CLI.
- **[OpenMeter](https://konghq.com/)**: Usage‑based billing, entitlements, and invoicing for APIs, events, and AI (acquired 2025). SaaS.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation / Market Cap**: $2 billion (as of late 2023 Series E round) – not publicly traded.
- **Key Metric**: Surpassed **$100M ARR** in late 2023; processes **+1 trillion API/AI requests per day**; **600+ employees** in 25+ countries (LinkedIn reports 738 employees with +23.5% YoY growth).
- **Total Funding**: **$344.1M** across 6 rounds (including Series D $100M at $1.4B, and Series E $175M led by new investors).
- **Notable Investors / Partners**: Include large institutional investors; partners include cloud providers and enterprises such as United Airlines (cited as customer). Open‑source community with 182K+ community users.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Most adopted open‑source API gateway** – strong developer mindshare and large community.
- **Unified platform** covering the entire API lifecycle plus AI agent management, reducing fragmentation for enterprises.
- **High‑performance, low‑latency** – proven at hyper‑volume (+1T requests/day), 99.99% availability SLA.
- **Strategic acquisitions** (Kuma, Insomnia, OpenMeter) that plug gaps in service mesh, developer tooling, and usage‑based billing.
- **Strong enterprise DNA** – trusted by global brands for mission‑critical applications.

## Strategic Focus
- **AI connectivity** – building the layer to manage LLM traffic, agent security, token cost, and real‑time data streams.
- **Monetization** – enabling customers to monetize APIs and AI consumption (chargeback, entitlements, pricing).
- **Developer productivity** – accelerating onboarding and reducing costs (claims 15% faster development, 57% operational cost reduction).
- **Global scale** – growing remote workforce and entering new geographic markets (e.g., Italy, ANZ roles posted).

## Why Work Here
- **Remote‑first culture** – 600+ employees across 25+ countries; strong emphasis on global collaboration.
- **Perks & benefits** (from [careers page](https://konghq.com/company/careers)):
  - Stock options for most employees
  - 4‑week paid sabbatical every 5 years
  - Flexible time off
  - Home office stipend
  - Regular “unplug days” (company‑wide long weekends)
  - Virtual events (Donut chats, trivia, fitness challenges)
- **Engineering culture** – values “owners, explorers, real, unstoppable” and encourages individual innovation. Focus on shipping fast and high trust.
- **Growth trajectory** – company is scaling (+23.5% headcount YoY) and is a unicorn with clear product‑market fit in a hot market (AI + API management).
- **Open roles** – 93 open positions across engineering, sales, solutions, customer success, and marketing.

## Sources
1. [konghq.com](https://konghq.com/)
2. [konghq.com/company/careers](https://konghq.com/company/careers)
3. [konghq.com/company/about-us](https://konghq.com/company/about-us)
4. [linkedin.com/company/konghq](https://www.linkedin.com/company/konghq)
5. [jobs.ashbyhq.com/kong](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/kong)

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- [Commercial Account Executive](https://feeny.ai/job/commercial-account-executive-kong-singapore-2hwrft68j9kj) — Singapore
- [Commercial Account Executive](https://feeny.ai/job/commercial-account-executive-kong-australia-bfhqkn00krqb) — Australia
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