Lead the founding QA team ensuring Cisco’s multi-cloud networking platform is production-ready for Early 2026 Alpha launch. As Lead QA Engineer, you’ll define the quality strategy, architect test frameworks, mentor the QA team, and ensure MCN networking services meet the highest reliability standards across AWS, Azure, and GCP.

Your Impact: Architect the comprehensive quality strategy for MCN’s Alpha launch in Early 2026 ensuring Fortune 500 customer networks experience flawless IPsec tunnels, BGP routing, and AutoVPN from day one.

The Team: Lead a 4-person QA team (US, India). You’ll provide technical leadership, establish best practices, and coordinate with Backend, DevOps, and SRE leaders.

What You’ll Do

• Define Quality Strategy: Architect MCN’s comprehensive quality strategy for Alpha, Beta, and GA releases
• Build Test Architecture: Design scalable test automation frameworks using Python and open-source tools (Pytest, Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress)
• Technical Leadership: Mentor Grade 10/8 QA engineers, conduct test plan reviews, and establish team best practices
• E2E Test Ownership: Lead development of sophisticated tests for IPsec tunnels, BGP routing, AutoVPN mesh, and cross-cloud connectivity
• AI-Native Quality Engineering: Champion development of MCP servers and AI agents that generate test cases, detect anomalies, predict failures, and provide automated root cause analysis
• Scale & Performance: Design and oversee scale tests, performance benchmarks, and chaos engineering experiments

Required Skills (Must Have)

• 10+ years QA automation leadership building test suites at scale
• Proven leadership mentoring and guiding QA/engineering teams
• Python expertise for test automation and framework development
• Test frameworks mastery – Pytest, Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress
• Networking knowledge – TCP/IP stack, routing (BGP), VPN technologies (IPsec)
• Cloud experience – AWS, Azure, or GCP in production
• Testing complex distributed systems across regions
• Data-driven approach to quality metrics and decisions

Preferred Skills (Nice to Have)

• IPsec protocol and VPN architecture testing
• Multi-cloud testing leadership (AWS + Azure + GCP)
• Performance testing and optimization methodologies
• Chaos engineering frameworks

We’ll Teach You

• VPP (Vector Packet Processing) data plane testing
• MCN networking architecture (AutoVPN, regional distribution, cross-cloud coordination)
• Advanced AI-native QA with MCP server development

Why Join MCN?

Ground Floor Impact – Alpha launch Early 2026—your quality strategy defines customer success – Lead QA for infrastructure handling billions of transactions across 9 regions – Shape testing architecture and culture from day one

AI-Native from Day One – Champion Cursor, Codex, Windsurf across your QA team – Build MCP servers that auto-generate tests from API specs – Create AI agents that detect patterns and predict test failures before they happen – Transform reactive testing into proactive, intelligent quality engineering

Career Growth – Clear path to Principal QA Engineer or QA Architect roles – Rare multi-cloud QA leadership: AWS + Azure + GCP – Build and scale QA team from Alpha through GA – Direct collaboration with architects and principal engineers

Team Culture – Lead a high-impact QA team (4 engineers growing to 8+) – High autonomy—you define QA strategy and architecture – Weekly tech talks and knowledge sharing leadership – Direct partnership with engineering leadership

Tech Stack

Core: Python, Pytest, Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress
Languages: Python (primary), Go (tools), Ruby (Dashboard), JavaScript
Cloud: AWS, Azure, GCP
Tools: Kubernetes, Terraform, Docker, GitHub Actions, Grafana, ELK, Kafka

We know everyone’s stack is different and skills translate. If you’ve led QA teams at scale and love learning, you’re likely a great fit.

Standout Candidates Have

· Built MCP servers or AI agents for test automation

· VPP or high-performance networking testing leadership

· Chaos engineering expertise leading reliability programs

· Conference speaking or technical writing on QA topics

Why Cisco?

At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint.

Fueled by the depth and breadth of our technology, we experiment and create meaningful solutions. Add to that our worldwide network of doers and experts, and you’ll see that the opportunities to grow and build are limitless. We work as a team, collaborating with empathy to make really big things happen on a global scale. Because our solutions are everywhere, our impact is everywhere.

We are Cisco, and our power starts with you.