Jobs / United States / OpenAI UK Ltd
Host Systems Software Engineer
OpenAI UK Ltd · 🇺🇸 San Francisco
Sponsorship verdict
No sponsorship evidence yet
No government record and no wording either way. Not a refusal — ask the recruiter.
- No government sponsor record hereThis employer does not appear with approvals in the government data SponsorApply holds.
- The posting doesn’t mention sponsorshipSilence isn’t a refusal — ask the recruiter before investing much time.
- No salary bar for this routeH-1B has no fixed salary bar: the employer must pay at least the prevailing wage for the role and area. Cap-subject employers enter a lottery weighted by wage level. Source: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/12/29/2025-23853/weighted-selection-process-for-registrants-and-petitioners-seeking-to-file-cap-subject-h-1b, rules effective 2026-02-27.
- Confirmed live todayWhen a source last listed this job as open.
US H-1B: cap-subject employers enter a lottery weighted by wage level — Level I gets 1 entry, Level IV gets 4 (DHS projected selection odds ≈15% at Level I to ≈61% at Level IV). Universities and non-profit research employers are cap-exempt. The $100,000 fee for new petitions from abroad is currently blocked by a court order (appeal pending).
A verdict summarises public evidence; it is not legal advice and never a guarantee — the employer and the immigration authority decide. Sign in to factor in where you can already work.
Or apply yourself on the official page →
Why not apply?
No register record and no sponsorship wording in the posting. Worth asking the employer before investing significant time.
SponsorApply flags time-wasters so your applications go where they can land. These come from the posting's own wording — read the original listing to confirm. See better-fit alternatives →
Sponsor Radar — OpenAI UK Ltd
This employer does not appear with approvals in the government data SponsorApply holds.
Past sponsorship or register membership never guarantees sponsorship for this vacancy or for you. Full Sponsor Radar for OpenAI UK Ltd →
About the role
About the Team OpenAI’s Hardware organization develops AI-native silicon and system-level solutions for the unique demands of advanced AI workloads. Building on efforts like Jalapeño, the team is developing future generations of AI-native silicon and tightly integrated systems to power the next generation of frontier models. By co-designing chips, systems, tools, and methodologies, the team helps deliver faster, more efficient, and production-ready hardware for OpenAI’s supercomputing platform. About the Role We’re looking for an experienced systems software engineer to help define and build the host software stack for our custom next-generation AI systems. You will work close to the hardware on performance-critical software, including Linux kernel drivers, high-throughput I/O paths, and system-scale networking and RDMA. This role spans architecture, implementation, platform bring-up, debugging, and performance optimization. You will work across hardware and software boundaries to make new systems usable end to end, from low-level device interfaces through userspace tooling and production validation. In this role you will: - Design, implement, and debug host-side systems software for AI infrastructure, including Linux kernel drivers and supporting userspace components. - Build and optimize software paths for high-throughput, low-latency communication, including RDMA and related networking functionality. - Develop software around PCIe, DMA, NICs, accelerators, memory movement, and device interaction. - Bring up new hardware platforms and diagnose complex issues across kernel, firmware, networking, and hardware boundaries. - Build tooling for integration, testing, diagnostics, observability, qualification, and performance characterization. - Collaborate with hardware, networking, and platform teams to define interfaces and integrate new capabilities. - Work with external vendors where needed to integrate technologies and drive issues to resolution. - Contribute across the systems software stack as the platform and team evolve. - Help shape the technical direction and engineering practices for a growing systems software stack. You might thrive in this role if you have: - Experience building low-level or performance-critical systems software. - Strong programming skills in C or C++, with proficiency using Python and Linux tooling for automation and debugging. - Strong Linux systems fundamentals and the ability to debug across hardware and software boundaries. - Hands-on experience in at least one relevant area, such as Linux kernel drivers, kernel networking, RDMA, PCIe, DMA, NIC software, accelerator software, or high-performance I/O. - Experience owning complex software projects from design through implementation, bring-up, and validation. - Ability to thrive in ambiguity, work across subsystem boundaries, and build systems from scratch. - Strong cross-functional communication skills. Preferred Qualifications - Experience developing Linux kernel drivers or other OS-level performance-critical components. - Familiarity with RDMA or RoCE, ibverbs, kernel networking, or congestion-control concepts such as ECN and DCQCN. - Experience with PCIe, DMA, peer-to-peer communication, SR-IOV, IOMMU, dma-buf, or related accelerator and I/O subsystems. - Experience bringing up accelerators, NICs, SoCs, or custom hardware platforms. - Experience profiling and optimizing high-throughput, low-latency systems. - Familiarity with Rust or experience using Rust for systems programming. To comply with U.S. export control laws and regulations, candidates for this role may need to meet certain legal status requirements as provided in those laws and regulations. About OpenAI OpenAI is an AI research and d