Senior AI Engineer

• We’re looking for a Senior Software Engineer with a passion for AI to join us in our mission of bringing the ION Factory OS to next-generation hardware builders around the globe. This role is based in Los Angeles, CA (HQ in El Segundo)
• Are you excited by the opportunity to build AI-powered software that accelerates the development of eVTOLs, rockets, robots, and autonomous vehicles?
• Lead the design, implementation, and optimization of production-ready AI systems within the ION Factory OS
• Ship customer-facing features that directly impact manufacturing workflows, including AI-driven functionality (e.g., generative procedure creation, anomaly detection, recommendations) and core product features not reliant on AI
• Architect and maintain scalable software systems, including AI/ML pipelines and broader product infrastructure
• Design and implement AI features using retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipelines to deliver context-aware insights and recommendations
• Leverage Model Context Protocol (MCP) and similar frameworks to connect AI models seamlessly with structured/unstructured data sources and external tools
• Collaborate with product managers and customers to translate real-world challenges into robust software solutions
• Partner with data engineering to process and transform structured and unstructured manufacturing data into usable formats
• Ensure reliability, scalability, and maintainability of all systems in production, leveraging CI/CD and cloud-native workflows
• Stay ahead of advancements in software engineering and AI, bringing the best practices into shipped product features
• Mentor junior engineers and help raise the technical bar across the team

Benefits

• Medical, dental & vision
• Generous life and disability insurance for you and your family
• Flexible PTO
• 401K retirement plan with employer match
• Other financial benefits and services to give you financial peace of mind
• Equity
• Up to 16 weeks of parental leave
• Flexible spending accounts
• Work-from-home setup
• Remote & hybrid options (role dependent)
• Amazing office in Downtown LA- Proven track record of building and shipping customer-facing applications (AI and non-AI) that deliver measurable business value
• Strong knowledge of APIs and modern software design patterns for integrating AI into SaaS products
• 7+ years of professional software engineering experience, including 3+ years shipping AI/ML-powered products into production
• Expertise in data modeling, preprocessing, and model evaluation at scale
• Experience architecting scalable systems on cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP)
• Passion for AI innovation paired with the ability to deliver non-AI product functionality when needed
• Excellent problem-solving, communication, and cross-functional collaboration skills
• Familiarity with generative AI models (LLMs, diffusion models, GANs) and their real-world applications
• Experience building AI systems for real-time, low-latency, or edge deployments
• Familiarity with modern data governance, privacy, and compliance standards (SOC2, GDPR, ITAR)
• Hands-on experience with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) for building AI systems that combine large language models with external knowledge sources
• Understanding of and/or experience with Model Context Protocol (MCP) or similar emerging standards for connecting AI systems with data and tools
• Customer-facing experience gathering requirements, presenting solutions, and demonstrating value
• Contributions to open-source projects or published research in applied AI/ML
• Experience mentoring engineers and contributing to engineering best practices