Principal / Architect of AI Systems | USD 180-275k / year

USD 180-275k / yearWe are seeking a Principal AI Architect to drive technical vision, accelerate AI delivery, and serve as the organization’s leading expert in modern AI systems. This is a highly hands-on, forward-leaning role focused on research, experimentation, and delivering cutting-edge AI solutions across multiple products and clients. The ideal candidate blends deep architectural expertise with rapid execution. This role involves staying ahead of emerging AI frameworks, designing scalable AI system patterns, and building prototypes that demonstrate measurable impact quickly. Define and own the end-to-end AI architectural vision across projects. Research and evaluate emerging AI models, frameworks, and agentic patterns. Spend ~50% of time learning, testing, and validating new AI capabilities. Spend ~50% of time building prototypes, shipping features, and accelerating delivery. Design AI system architectures including RAG pipelines, vector search, orchestration layers, agent workflows, and LLM integrations. Evaluate and recommend tooling across LLM platforms, vector databases, embeddings, retrieval systems, and orchestration frameworks. Develop reusable architecture patterns, best practices, and standards for AI development. Drive a culture of rapid iteration with near-daily visible progress. Partner with engineering, data, product, and cloud teams to ensure alignment and technical scalability. Coach teams on responsible AI development and modern AI engineering practices. Required Skills Extensive experience designing and shipping AI systems end-to-end. Strong expertise with LLMs, agentic architectures, retrieval-augmented generation, and AI orchestration patterns. Deep hands-on proficiency with tools such as Azure OpenAI, AWS Bedrock, LangChain, vector DBs, embeddings pipelines, and MLOps workflows. Strong background in software architecture, data engineering, and cloud infrastructure. Proven ability to research emerging technologies and rapidly translate them into working prototypes. Demonstrated ability to move fast while maintaining technical rigor and reliability. Excellent communication skills with the ability to explain complex AI concepts clearly.  Nice-to-Have Skills Experience working with Microsoft Fabric or similar data platforms. Prior experience accelerating delivery cycles in AI-focused environments. Background designing AI solutions for enterprise-scale environments.