Overview

The Enterprise + Devices Licensing Engineering team designs and operates the core services that power how Microsoft products are licensed and activated at global scale. Our team is responsible for building highly reliable, secure, and performant systems that underpin Microsoft 365 and Copilot across consumers, businesses, and enterprises worldwide.

We sit at the heart of Microsoft’s licensing ecosystem—owning the platforms that enable customers to acquire, activate, and use Microsoft products seamlessly. Our work directly impacts revenue integrity, customer trust, and the ability for teams across Microsoft to innovate and ship at speed. Operating across multiple geographies and partner organizations, the team tackles complex technical and business challenges in a fast‑paced, collaborative environment.

We are hiring a Principal Software Engineer. If you are passionate about building mission‑critical distributed systems, enjoy working at the intersection of engineering, commerce, and product strategy, and want to influence how Microsoft delivers value to hundreds of millions of customers, this team offers a unique opportunity to make a broad and lasting impact.

As Microsoft continues its transformation toward cloud services and AI‑powered experiences, the Licensing Engineering team plays a foundational role in re‑inventing how products are delivered, governed, and scaled—ensuring every customer interaction with Microsoft starts from a trusted, resilient licensing platform.

This position is based at the Redmond campus with 3 days per week work in the office and 2 days per week work from home. Relocation assistance is available.

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical expertise for the design and implementation of the future architecture for proven highly scalable, resilient, durable, maintainable, performant services and user experiences.
• Lead and actively participate in the full software development life cycle:
• Create design and architecture documents.
• Implement new components and infrastructure.
• Ensure safe release of updated experiences, with special consideration for security, privacy, compliance, and accessibility.
• Foster a data driven approach with focus on the customer.
• Collaborate with multiple teams across Microsoft for joint delivery of customer experiences.
• Drive the definition of requirements, KPIs, priorities and planning of large features and components.
• Evolve development guidelines, practices, systems, and tools to meet a world where client and services development and delivery is moving faster than ever.

Qualifications Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 6+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to C# orJavaScript
• OR equivalent experience.

Other Requirements:

Ability to meet Microsoft, customer and/or government security screening requirements are required for this role. These requirements include but are not limited to the following specialized security screenings: Microsoft Cloud Background Check: This position will be required to pass the Microsoft Cloud background check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Extensive industry experience designing, building, testing, shipping, and maintaining software and services.
• Background in designing and deploying systems and services powered by AI infrastructure, with emphasis on scalability, reliability, and performance in production environments.
• Proven experience in the design and implementation of architecture for proven highly scalable, resilient, durable, maintainable, performant services and user experiences.
• Ability to attract, hire, and retain top talent.
• Ability to analyse, interpret, and communicate data to uncover opportunities for improvement.
• Excellence in software engineering practices - system design, coding, testing, and monitoring, and analytical problem-solving skills.
• Excellence in safe release, deployment and maintenance of cloud services using experimentation and telemetry.
• Experience with one or more of the following
• C#, ASP.NET, JavaScript, Service Fabric, Web Services, APIs.
• Passion for making software engineering more efficient by designing and developing solutions at scale and make data driven decisions.

#DPG #DPGHiring #ExDGrowth

Software Engineering IC5 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $139,900 - $274,800 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $188,000 - $304,200 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here:
https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay

This position will be open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance with religious accommodations and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, read more about requesting accommodations.