Physical Network & Structured Cabling Engineer

About the Team

OpenAI is on a bold mission to build the world’s most advanced AI infrastructure. We are seeking a Data Center Network and Structured Cabling Engineer with 10+ years of experience in designing and implementing optimized network and structured cabling solutions at large data centers buildings and data center campuses.

Role Summary

As a Physical Network & Structured Cabling Engineer, you will own the design, implementation, and quality assurance of structured cabling and physical network infrastructure across OpenAI’s global data center footprint. This role bridges design, construction, and operations, ensuring that every layer of our physical networking from fiber trunks to copper patching meets the highest standards of performance, reliability, and scalability.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and specify physical network infrastructure across data center buildings and campuses, including fiber and copper cabling, network rooms, rack layouts, cable trays, and duct bank pathways. Coordinate with other engineering disciplines to ensure network infrastructure space, power, cooling, and operational requirements are incorporated into the overall design

• Develop standards, reference designs, and installation guidelines for structured cabling and physical network deployments.

• Translate logical network architectures and hardware connectivity requirements into scalable physical designs, including fiber topology, port connectivity, patching, redundancy, and capacity planning, in partnership with network engineering and operations teams.

• Provide technical direction to design consultants, cabling vendors, and installation contractors, resolving scope gaps and ensuring designs are constructible and meet network requirements.

• Define installation quality and acceptance criteria, and oversee inspection, testing, commissioning, and turnover of structured cabling systems.

• Lead physical network design reviews, coordinate clash detection and resolution with other disciplines, and conduct site inspections to verify installation quality and conformance with design and operational requirements.

• Troubleshoot and resolve issues during build, commissioning, and handover phases to ensure network readiness.

• Develop and maintain physical network documentation, including design requirements, drawings, port maps, cable schedules, bills of materials, labeling standards, and as-built records.

• Provide feedback to design and operations teams to drive continuous improvement of physical network standards.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, Telecommunications, or related field, or equivalent experience.

• 10+ years of experience designing and delivering physical network infrastructure and structured cabling systems for large-scale data centers, including responsibility for design decisions, construction coordination, and operational readiness.

• Strong understanding of data center network topologies and high-speed optical connectivity, including transceivers, fiber types, breakout configurations, connector and polarity schemes, and optical loss budgets.

• Expertise in industry standards such as ANSI/TIA, BICSI and other relevant structured cabling guidelines.

• Proven ability to coordinate with cross-functional teams and external vendors on large-scale projects.

• Strong skills in reviewing and interpreting technical drawings, cable schedules, and documentation management.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to engage both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

• Willingness to travel frequently to global data center sites.

Preferred Skills

• Master’s degree in Engineering, or relevant certifications such as BICSI, RCDD, or equivalent.

• Experience with hyperscale cloud, AI, or high-performance computing environments.

• Proficiency in 2D and 3D engineering tools (e.g., CAD, Revit) for infrastructure design and clash detection analysis.

• Experience with structured connectivity data and automation for generating and validating port maps, cable schedules, bills of materials, and labels.

• Strong analytical and troubleshooting skills for physical layer systems and issues.