Principal Software Developer, Autodesk
Frontend Architecture
3D design, engineering & entertainment software
Open for applications
3D design, engineering & entertainment software
1001+ employees
Open for applications
1001+ employees
Company mission
To empower innovators with design and make technology so they can achieve the new possible.
Role
Who you are
- Typically 8–12 years of professional software engineering experience
- Proven experience owning and evolving large frontend systems
- Demonstrated impact across multiple teams or initiatives
- Proven work integrating 3D/graphics, advanced data visualization, and AI-assisted workflows into production-grade or deeply prototyped frontend systems
- Deep expertise in frontend development (JavaScript/TypeScript, HTML, CSS)
- Strong experience with modern frontend frameworks (e.g., React or equivalent)
- Solid understanding of frontend architecture, state management, and performance
- Experience working across the full stack and with complex APIs
- Strong testing, observability, and debugging practices
- Experience working with 3D rendering, graphics pipelines, or spatial data in modern web applications
- Experience designing frontend architectures that support complex, linked interactions and synchronized state across visualization surfaces
- Demonstrated experience building or prototyping AI-augmented UX systems, including copilots, agent-driven workflows, or adaptive interaction models
- Ability to design systems that handle ambiguity, asynchronous AI updates, and non-deterministic workflow states
- Teams rely on you to unblock complex frontend challenges
- Architectural decisions you make reduce future rework and scale across projects
- Research and product teams ship faster because of systems you’ve built
- You elevate frontend quality and consistency beyond your immediate team
- You are seen as a technical leader, not just a strong implementer
Desirable
- Proven experience integrating 3D/graphics systems with complex, linked user interactions across multiple coordinated views or data surfaces
- Strong experience building data visualization systems, including graph-based interaction models and linked analytical views
- Experience shipping (or deeply prototyping) AI-assisted user experiences such as copilots, agent workflows, adaptive interfaces, or intelligent automation systems
- Comfortable designing and implementing frontend systems for “agentic” workflows where state may be probabilistic, evolving, or partially unpredictable
- Enable rapid prototyping while designing for scalability and reuse
- Help define pathways for transitioning research prototypes into supported products
- Collaborate with UX Research and Design on dynamic UX research platforms
- Contribute to visual storytelling systems that communicate complex data clearly
- Lead by example through high-impact hands-on contributions
- Mentor senior and mid-level developers; raise frontend engineering standards
- Provide technical guidance during design and architecture reviews
- Help align teams around shared technical approaches and best practices
- Act as a trusted technical partner to Product, Design, and Research leaders
- Communicate trade-offs and technical constraints clearly to stakeholders
- Influence roadmaps by connecting technical insights to user and business needs
- Experience in AEC, construction technology, or platform ecosystems
- Familiarity with 3D, visualization, or spatial data in web applications
- Experience in research-heavy or exploratory product environments
- Interest in sustainability, net-zero initiatives, or intelligent construction systems
- Prior experience leading frontend initiatives without formal management authority
What the job involves
- As a Principal Software Developer, Frontend Development, you are a senior technical leader and hands-on developer responsible for designing, delivering, and evolving frontend systems that span multiple features, initiatives, or teams
- You own architectural decisions for significant frontend areas and serve as a technical anchor for interaction-focused, research-driven, and production web experiences
- You work closely with Product, Experience Design, Research, and Platform Engineering to move work from intent to experience, ensuring solutions are scalable, maintainable, and aligned with Autodesk’s strategic priorities
- Owns large subsystems or end-to-end experiences across teams or initiatives
- Drives architectural decisions that impact multiple projects
- Anticipates technical risks and proactively designs solutions
- Influences technical direction without formal authority
- Recognized as a frontend subject-matter expert within the organization
- Lead the design and implementation of complex frontend architectures
- Define patterns, frameworks, and shared components used across teams
- Balance short-term delivery with long-term technical health
- Ensure frontend systems meet standards for performance, accessibility, and reliability
- Build and maintain sophisticated, data-rich, interaction-heavy user interfaces
- Lead development of systems integrating multiple workflows and interaction models
- Drive integrations with Autodesk platforms and tools, including:
- Existing-conditions and reality capture workflows
- Construction Twin and intelligent construction systems
- Robotics, automation, and adaptive asset platforms
- Partner with backend developers to shape APIs and data contracts
Our take
Autodesk supplies software that enables teams to collaborate, design, simulate, and fabricate their ideas in 3D, serving a range of industries such as engineering, product design, and entertainment. Founded in 1982, the company first delivered the AutoCAD system, a commercial computer-aided design and drafting software application, that is still seeing updated releases to this day.
Over 100 million people use Autodesk software across various industries and applications – in some of which it remains nearly irreplaceable. The company has an impressive history of diversification, which it continues to this day. For example, the 2022 acquisition of Moxion, a cloud-based platform for digital dailies used by leading filmmakers, bolstered the company’s offerings for the media and entertainment industry.
The rise of AR and VR technologies is driving modern growth in the computer-aided design market, creating space for Autodesk to expand further. Additionally, a shift to the popular SaaS model positions the company to seek further success.
Kirsty
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
4% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Company HQ
SoMa, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Andrew Anagnost
(CEO & President)Has worked at the company since 1997, including as CMO and Senior Vice President of Business Strategy and Marketing. Became CEO in 2017.
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