# Vivek J. > Principal Engineer | Backend Architect Location: San Francisco Bay Area, United States Profile: https://flows.cv/vivekj Principal Engineer | Cloud Security Platforms | Distributed Systems Architect Principal Engineer and backend architect with 20+ years of experience building secure, distributed systems at the intersection of cloud infrastructure and enterprise cybersecurity. Deep expertise designing and delivering Control Plane architectures, Zero Trust frameworks, and cloud security platforms — with production deployments spanning IaaS, hybrid, and multi-cloud environments. Career spans some of the most recognized names in cybersecurity and observability — Zscaler, Netskope and Normalyze (acquired by Proofpoint) — contributing to solutions across Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA), Secure Web Gateway (SWG), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM), and Data Security Posture Management (DSPM). Comfortable operating at both the architectural and hands-on engineering levels, with a track record of building greenfield platforms that become core product pillars. Additional experience: - Python, Golang, Java, Node.js, Ruby On Rails, C#, C++ - AWS, GCP, Azure, Kubernetes, Temporal, Orkes (Workflow Orchestration) - Graph DB, Postgres, MongoDB, MySQL - OTEL, Redis, Kafka, GCP Pub/Sub - Git, TDD (test driven development), Agile / Waterfall model of software development ## Work Experience ### Principal Engineer @ Zscaler Jan 2025 – Present Design and development of Zero Trust Gateway that transforms how customers secure public cloud workloads and workload traffic. Implemented Control Plane orchestration, telemetry, authentication mechanism amongst other features. ### Senior Staff Software Engineer @ Netskope Jan 2018 – Jan 2025 | San Francisco Bay Area Designing and Developing a Highly Available, Fault Tolerant and Scalable backend for supporting Netskope Private Access - a cloud based service that allows secure access to private enterprise applications (ZTNA). Developed a Continuous Security Assessment Platform that secures and monitors the entire IaaS cloud footprint for Enterprise customers. Developed a content distribution platform that can synchronize data across Netskope's global infrastructure. Technologies used: Python, Golang, Ruby on Rails, Kafka, MongoDB, Postgres, MySQL, Redis, Celery, Kubernetes, Helm, GCP, AWS, Drone, Spinnaker ### Senior Software Engineer @ AppDynamics Jan 2014 – Jan 2018 | San Francisco Bay Area Developed scalable, distributed platforms and services for AppDynamics' Application Performance Management solution. Migrated monolithic services to a microservices based architecture. Worked on visualization of application topologies (Flow Map). Added SAML and LDAP integration to the SaaS platform. Technologies Used : Java, MySQL, Guice, Redis, Gradle. ### MTS 3 @ VMWare Jan 2013 – Jan 2014 | San Francisco Bay Area Worked in the Storage and Availability organization within vSphere (VMWare's suite of tools for cloud computing) for features like "vSphere API for Input Output filtering"​ and "Virtual Volumes (native storage of VMs inside a storage system connected via Ethernet/SAN)". Technologies Used : Java, C++, Python, Web Services (SOAP/Apache Axis), vSphere Storage, Ant. ### Software Engineer @ Moody's Analytics Jan 2010 – Jan 2013 Developer for Moody's Analytics'​ Scenario Analyzer product used by financial institutions to evaluate their health under various situations. Debugged and resolved key client issues, integrated the product with other Moody's services, performed performance enhancements for key features. Created a keyword based test automation framework and integrated it with Jenkins build environment facilitating enhanced test coverage of various products and regular build evaluation. Technologies used : Java, Web Services (Apache CXF/SOAP/REST), Hibernate, Spring, Maven. ### Software Engineer @ Alcatel-Lucent Jan 2005 – Jan 2008 Designed, developed and supported Call Processing Applications for Lucent's Evolution Data Optimized (EV-DO) Radio Network Controllers (RNC). These applications support high rate packet data services for mobile devices by performing functions such as setting up connections, transferring packet data to cell towers, taking care of call handoffs etc. Technologies used : C++, Network Programming, EV-DO/Rev-A ## Education ### M.Eng in Computer Science Cornell University ### Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.) in Computer Science B. M. S. College of Engineering ## Contact & Social - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/vivek-j-99b06115 --- Source: https://flows.cv/vivekj JSON Resume: https://flows.cv/vivekj/resume.json Last updated: 2026-04-12