Senior Applied AI Engineer

Summary

Join Invoca's Data Platform team as an Applied AI Engineer and architect the future of customer interaction. You will design, build, and deploy scalable AI applications using foundation models, engineer advanced RAG and agentic systems, and contribute to rigorous AI agent evaluation. This role demands expertise in prompt engineering, building for scale and reliability, and championing MLOps for generative AI. You will translate business needs into AI-powered solutions, working closely with product and engineering teams. This is a remote position open to candidates in the US and Canada, offering competitive salary and benefits.

Requirements

• Proven Experience: 5+ years of professional experience in Applied AI Engineering, ML Engineering, or a closely related role with a strong focus on building and deploying AI-powered applications
• Applied AI & Python Expertise: Advanced proficiency in Python and hands-on experience building applications with leading AI/ML frameworks (e.g., LangChain, LlamaIndex, CrewAI, PyTorch). You are an expert with data and ML libraries (e.g., Pandas, spaCy)
• Production Generative AI Champion: Demonstrated success deploying and maintaining applications powered by LLMs and other generative models in a production environment
• Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) Expertise: Deep, hands-on experience designing, building, and optimizing RAG pipelines. This includes expertise in vector databases (e.g., Qdrant, Pinecone, Weaviate), embedding strategies, and chunking techniques
• Agentic AI System Evaluation Expertise: Demonstrable experience with modern evaluation techniques for multi-step AI agents. You should be able to speak to the trade-offs of evaluating reasoning traces, tool usage, and final outcomes using frameworks like LangSmith, DeepEval, Ragas, TruLens, or custom-built solutions
• Prompt Engineering & In-Context Learning: Demonstrable skill in designing, testing, and optimizing complex prompts and few-shot examples to maximize model performance for specific tasks
• Fine-Tuning Proficiency: Experience in fine-tuning foundation models for specific downstream tasks, with a clear understanding of when to fine-tune versus when to use in-context learning or agentic approaches
• Scalable Model Serving: Advanced proficiency with API-driven frameworks for accessing and serving self-hosted foundation models (e.g., AWS SageMaker/Bedrock, Databricks Model Serving, TGI, vLLM), focusing on building resilient, scalable, and optimized integrations
• Performance and Cost Optimization: A proven ability to optimize AI systems for low latency and high throughput. You have experience with techniques like model quantization, caching strategies, and infrastructure choices to manage and reduce operational costs
• MLOps for AI Systems: Intermediate proficiency with MLOps tooling (e.g., MLFlow, Arize), and best practices for CI/CD, monitoring, and maintenance of complex AI systems
• Educational Foundation: Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Statistics, or a related field (or equivalent practical experience). An advanced degree (Master's or Ph.D.) is a strong plus
• This role is remote and open to candidates located in the United States and Canada only

Responsibilities

• Architect and Deploy Applied AI Systems: Design, build, and deploy scalable, production-grade applications using foundation models and other advanced AI techniques to directly influence product performance and efficiency
• Engineer Advanced RAG and Agentic Systems: Go beyond basic implementation. Engineer robust Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines and multi-step agentic workflows that can reason, use tools, and solve complex problems
• Contribute to Agentic AI System Evaluation: Establish and manage rigorous evaluation frameworks for complex AI agents. You will go beyond simple response quality to assess the entire agentic process, including the validity of reasoning steps, correctness of tool use, task completion rates, and overall robustness
• Excel in Prompt Engineering and Optimization: Craft, test, and manage sophisticated prompt chains and templates to ensure optimal performance, reliability, and cost-effectiveness from our AI models
• Build for Scale and Reliability: Develop resilient serving architectures that seamlessly integrate Large Language Models (LLMs) with enterprise systems, ensuring high availability and performance
• Champion MLOps for Applied AI: Develop and maintain sophisticated MLOps and CI/CD pipelines tailored for the unique challenges of generative AI, including prompt versioning, RAG pipeline management, and continuous evaluation of agent behavior
• Translate Business Needs into AI-Powered Solutions: Work as a strategic partner to product and engineering teams, deeply understanding customer challenges and translating them into innovative, viable, and impactful AI features

Benefits

• Flexible Time Off – We encourage a healthy work-life balance. Our flexible paid time off policy allows you to recharge and take time away as needed
• Paid Holidays – Invoca provides 16 U.S. paid holidays , including a winter break, giving you ample opportunity to refresh and spend time with friends and family
• Health Benefits – Our healthcare program includes medical, dental, and vision coverage, with multiple plan options so you can choose what works best for you and your family. Fertility assistance is also included
• Retirement – Invoca offers a 401(k) plan through Fidelity with a company match of up to 4%
• Stock Options – All employees are invited to share in Invoca’s success through stock options
• Mental Health Program – Well-being support on a broad range of issues is available through our SpringHealth program
• Paid Family Leave – Up to 6 weeks of 100% paid leave is provided for baby bonding, adoption, and caring for family members
• Paid Medical Leave – Up to 12 weeks of 100% paid leave is provided for childbirth and medical needs
• InVacation – As a thank-you to our long-term team members, we offer a bonus after 7 years of service
• Wellness Subsidy – We provide a subsidy that can be applied toward gym memberships, fitness classes, and more
• Position Base Range - Salary Range $160,000 - $252,000/ plus bonus potential