Principal Test Automation Engineer

We are looking for a Principal Test Automation Engineer who combines deep storage domain expertise with the ability to build AI-native workflows that multiply engineering productivity, find bugs faster, and reduce escapes. You will set standards for AI-assisted validation workflows and scale best practices across the team. This role requires solid knowledge of SAS, SCSI, NVMe, NVMe-oF, and TCP, along with hands-on experience using AI to accelerate test creation, exploratory testing, triage, root cause analysis, and workflow automation.

You will work across the full validation lifecycle — from requirements and user stories, to test planning and automation, to post-run triage, bug filing, documentation, and PR workflows — using tools like Jira and Jenkins, and MCP-enabled AI assistants. You won't just use existing tools; you'll build new ones where gaps exist.

You'll join a team that is actively investing in AI-native engineering practices and with MCP integrations already connecting our AI workflows to tools like Jira and Jenkins, and a roadmap to expand further across our automation platform and REST APIs. You'll have the opportunity to shape how AI transforms our validation workflows, not just execute someone else's playbook.

ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Translate requirements, design docs, and user stories into test plans, test cases, and pytest automation using AI-assisted and MCP-enabled workflows.
• Drive AI-assisted exploratory testing by identifying edge cases, negative scenarios, recurring failure patterns, and coverage gaps.
• Build and operationalize AI-driven triage, root cause analysis, and failure trend analysis — correlate logs, traces, firmware output, and hardware events across subsystems; build tools and dashboards that surface patterns, cut MTTR, and deliver data-backed release-readiness signals.
• Build reusable AI-driven workflows, templates, and playbooks across tools like Jira and Jenkins — including RAG-based knowledge systems grounded in platform specs, historical failures, and engineering documentation for test creation, triage, bug filing, documentation, execution summaries, and PR preparation.
• Mentor team members on AI-assisted engineering practices, prompt engineering, and MCP workflow adoption.
• Develop automated tests using pytest for firmware and storage subsystem validation across JBOD, JBOF, NAS, and SAN platforms.
• Optimize regression efficiency through risk-based test selection, rerun strategy improvements, prioritization, and flaky test detection and reduction.

RQUIRED

• B.S. or M.S. in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or related field
• Experience converting requirements and user stories into test plans, test cases, and automated validation using AI-assisted workflows.
• Experience applying AI tools in engineering workflows, including promp engineering, RAG, and tool/agent integrations (e.g., MCP); production experience is a plus, but strong demonstrated initiative counts.
• Strong experience in test automation and quality assurance, with significant focus on storage systems.
• Hands-on experience with Python and pytest
• Strong understanding of storage systems and validation methodologies
• Knowledge of SAS, SCSI, NVMe, NVMe-oF
• Understanding of TCP
• Strong Linux troubleshooting and system-level debugging skills
• Good understanding of hardware-software interaction
• Experience identifying coverage gaps, weak scenarios, and missing negative tests, with understanding of regression optimization and data-driven quality improvement
• Strong communication, collaboration, and problem-solving skills
• Self-driven and able to work effectively in a fast-paced environment

PREFERRED SKILLS

• Experience with AI-assisted IDEs (Windsurf, Cursor, Copilot) and custom workflow/rule authoring
• Active engagement with the AI landscape — you follow model releases, experiment with new tools, and bring relevant advances into your work.
• Experience testing REST APIs
• Experience with Fabric Switches
• Familiarity with RDMA/RoCE (used with NVMe-oF)
• Experience with HDD/SSD debugging
• Comfortable working in a lab/data center environment
• Experience building reusable automation frameworks, validation workflows, or engineering playbooks
• Familiarity with PR workflows, release validation, and engineering documentation
• Experience building internal tools and dashboards using Streamlit, Gradio FastAPI, or similar

Salary Range

126,800.00-169,100.00

At WD, our vision is to power global innovation and push the boundaries of technology to make what you thought was once impossible, possible.

At our core, WD is a company of problem solvers. People achieve extraordinary things given the right technology. For decades, we’ve been doing just that—our technology helped people put a man on the moon and capture the first-ever picture of a black hole.

We offer an expansive portfolio of technologies, HDDs, and platforms for business, creative professionals, and consumers alike under our Western Digital®, WD®, and WD_BLACK™.

We are a key partner to some of the largest and highest-growth organizations in the world. From enabling systems to make cities safer and more connected, to powering the data centers behind many of the world’s biggest companies and hyperscale cloud providers, to meeting the massive and ever-growing data storage needs of the AI era, WD is fueling a brighter, smarter future.

Today’s exceptional challenges require your unique skills. Together, we can build the future of data storage.

Western Digital is committed to providing equal opportunities to all applicants and employees and will not discriminate against any applicant or employee based on their race, color, ancestry, religion (including religious dress and grooming standards), sex (including pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions, breastfeeding or related medical conditions), gender (including a person’s gender identity, gender expression, and gender-related appearance and behavior, whether or not stereotypically associated with the person’s assigned sex at birth), age, national origin, sexual orientation, medical condition, marital status (including domestic partnership status), physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, protected medical and family care leave, Civil Air Patrol status, military and veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. We also prohibit harassment of any individual on any of the characteristics listed above. Our non-discrimination policy applies to all aspects of employment. We comply with the laws and regulations set forth in the "Know Your Rights: Workplace Discrimination is Illegal” poster. Our pay transparency policy is available here.

Western Digital thrives on the power and potential of diversity. As a global company, we believe the most effective way to embrace the diversity of our customers and communities is to mirror it from within. We believe the fusion of various perspectives results in the best outcomes for our employees, our company, our customers, and the world around us. We are committed to an inclusive environment where every individual can thrive through a sense of belonging, respect and contribution.

Western Digital is committed to offering opportunities to applicants with disabilities and ensuring all candidates can successfully navigate our careers website and our hiring process. Please contact us at jobs.accommodations@wdc.com to advise us of your accommodation request. In your email, please include a description of the specific accommodation you are requesting as well as the job title and requisition number of the position for which you are applying.

Based on our experience, we anticipate that the application deadline will be 08/15/2026 (3 months from posting), although we reserve the right to close the application process sooner if we hire an applicant for this position before the application deadline. If we are not able to hire someone from this role before the application deadline, we will update this

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Compensation & Benefits Details

• An employee’s pay position within the salary range may be based on several factors including but not limited to (1) relevant education; qualifications; certifications; and experience; (2) skills, ability, knowledge of the job; (3) performance, contribution and results; (4) geographic location; (5) shift; (6) internal and external equity; and (7) business and organizational needs.
• The salary range is what we believe to be the range of possible compensation for this role at the time of this posting.  We may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range and this range is only applicable for jobs to be performed in California, Colorado, New York or remote jobs that can be performed in California, Colorado and New York.  This range may be modified in the future.
• If your position is non-exempt, you are eligible for overtime pay pursuant to company policy and applicable laws.  You may also be eligible for shift differential pay, depending on the shift to which you are assigned.

• You will be eligible to be considered for bonuses under either WD’s Short Term Incentive Plan (“STI Plan”) or the Sales Incentive Plan (“SIP”) which provides incentive awards based on Company and individual performance, depending on your role and your performance. You may be eligible to participate in our annual Long-Term Incentive (LTI) program, which consists of restricted stock units (RSUs) or cash equivalents, pursuant to the terms of the LTI plan. Please note that not all roles are eligible to participate in the LTI program, and not all roles are eligible for equity under the LTI plan. RSU awards are also available to eligible new hires, subject to WD's Standard Terms and Conditions for Restricted Stock Unit Awards.

• We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid vacation time; paid sick leave; medical/dental/vision insurance; life, accident and disability insurance; tax-advantaged flexible spending and health savings accounts; employee assistance program; other voluntary benefit programs such as supplemental life and AD&D, legal plan, pet insurance, critical illness, accident and hospital indemnity; tuition reimbursement; transit; the Applause Program; employee stock purchase plan; and the WD Savings 401(k) Plan.
• Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole discretion, consistent with the law.

Notice To Candidates: Please be aware that WD and its subsidiaries will never request payment as a condition for applying for a position or receiving an offer of employment. Should you encounter any such requests, please report it immediately to WD Ethics Helpline or email compliance@wdc.com.