IonQ
Senior Systems and Network Engineer
College Park, Maryland, United States · Senior · Contract
Work authorization required$127k-$166kDetected 17 hours ago
PythonGoAWSGCPAzureCloud PlatformsKubernetesTerraformAnsibleLinuxDevOpsFinancial ModelingLogisticsHardware DesignControlsFirewallNetwork EngineeringResearch
About the role
- This is lab-grade systems and network engineering: closer to research computing at a national facility than to corporate IT.
- You will spend your time with real hardware, real cabling, and real failure modes, and automation of infrastructure to help us continue to scale.
Responsibilities
- Provision Linux servers and system heads for quantum hardware builds, including PXE boot, OS installation, and automated configuration
- Build and maintain infrastructure-as-code for server and network provisioning (Ansible, Kickstart, Foreman, Packer, Terraform, or equivalent), so systems are reproducible rather than hand-tuned
- Design, configure, and troubleshoot networking for lab and datacenter environments: VLANs, managed switches, firewalls, and structured cabling
- Use IPMI/BMC and other out-of-band tooling to manage a growing fleet of servers without physical intervention on every failure
- Define and document handoff criteria for when a system is ready to pass to the teams running experiments on it
- Diagnose and resolve infrastructure issues that are actively blocking a hardware build or an experimental run, and treat that urgency accordingly
- Partner with software, DevOps, and hardware engineering teams to understand what a new system needs before it arrives
- this is not a design-and-delegate role
Requirements
- 6+ years of experience in systems, network, or infrastructure engineering, with real hands-on time provisioning servers, not just managing a team that did
- Hands-on experience configuring and troubleshooting switches, firewalls, routers, and on-prem servers in a production environment
- Working knowledge of IPMI/BMC and out-of-band server management
- Comfort operating in an environment where infrastructure failure directly blocks the work, and where the playbook for a new hardware generation is still being written
- Experience integrating non-standard or custom hardware into a compute environment: a scientific instrument, a specialist peripheral, or a device with a custom driver
- Due to applicable export control laws and regulations, candidates must be a U.S. citizen or national, U.S. permanent resident (i.e., current Green Card holder), or lawfully admitted into the U.S. as a refugee or granted asylum.
Nice to have
- Experience at a company running significant on-prem compute infrastructure at scale (bare-metal cloud, colocation, high-density compute), where you managed a real fleet rather than a handful of machines
- Experience with configuration drift detection and enforcement, and can describe how you verified idempotency in a provisioning pipeline
- Experience in a research, national lab, or scientific compute environment
- Prior exposure to quantum computing or another deep-tech hardware domain (not required
- hands-on infrastructure experience matters far more than domain background)
- We empower employees to thrive by fostering a culture of autonomy, productivity, and respect.
- US Technical Jobs.
- The position you are applying for will require access to technology that is subject to U.S. export control and government contract restrictions.
Skills
- In 2025, the company achieved 99.99% two-qubit gate fidelity, setting a world record in quantum computing performance.
- IonQ is making quantum platforms more accessible and impactful than ever before.
Compensation
- Posted base salary figures are subject to change as new market data becomes available.
Benefits
- will vary based on individual factors such as education, qualifications, and experience of the final candidate(s), specific
- Our benefits include comprehensive medical, dental, and vision plans, matching 401(k), unlimited PTO and paid holidays, parental/adoption leave, legal insurance, and a home technology stipend.
- Details of participation in these benefit plans will be provided when a candidate receives an offer of employment.
- We are committed to equity and justice.
- office location, and calibration against relevant market data and internal team equity.
Visa & Work Authorization
- export control and government contract restrictions
This listing is sourced directly from IonQ's careers page and normalized into a canonical job model.