Principal Software Engineering Lead; AI

Overview

Launch is actively seeking a visionary Solutions Architect / Principal Software Engineering Lead (AI) to design and deliver modern engineering and applied AI solutions across client engagements. This role blends deep hands-on engineering, architectural leadership, AI system design, and client advisory. You will operate across system design, production-grade engineering, multi-agent architectures, cloud platform strategy, and the development of Launch’s AI practice.

• Define the technical direction for client engagements end-to-end: discovery, design, build, and production hardening.
• Assess client technology ecosystems and identify high-impact opportunities for AI/ML integration.
• Lead architecture reviews, design sessions, and technology selection across cross-functional stakeholder groups.
• Translate ambiguous business problems into concrete engineering plans with clear scope, milestones, and risk callouts.
• Architect production agentic systems including multi-agent orchestration, agent harnesses, skill/tool composition, human-in-the-loop checkpoints, and inter-agent communication protocols (e.g., A2A, MCP).
• Build and govern MCP server ecosystems: design, deploy, and secure Model Context Protocol integrations connecting AI agents to enterprise data sources, internal APIs, and third-party platforms.
• Define agent skill and capability frameworks including reusable skill libraries, prompt engineering standards, and evaluation harnesses for consistent agent behavior across engagements.
• Architect RAG pipelines, fine-tuning workflows, and model lifecycle infrastructure (training, serving, experiment tracking) as foundational components of agentic systems.
• Integrate AI platforms and APIs (Azure OpenAI, Amazon Bedrock, Anthropic, Vertex AI) into production systems with enterprise-grade reliability, cost governance, and observability.
• Establish AI-native development practices: embed tools such as Claude Code, Cursor, and Git Hub Copilot into team workflows with standards for AI-assisted code review, test generation, and documentation.
• Design evaluation and observability infrastructure including LLM eval frameworks, red-teaming, behavioral drift detection, and production monitoring across tool call chains, latency, and failure modes.
• Apply responsible AI governance: define guardrails, access controls, and audit patterns for agentic workflows in enterprise environments including scope containment and escalation paths.
• Write production code and lead by example — this role requires someone who is still close to the code.
• Design cloud-native architectures across multiple hyperscalers (AWS and Azure primarily) microservices, event-driven systems, serverless, and containerized workloads.
• Define and implement infrastructure-as-code using tools such as Terraform, Pulumi, Cloud Formation, or Bicep.
• Design and optimize CI/CD pipelines, Git Ops workflows, and container orchestration using Docker and Kubernetes.
• Establish observability and reliability practices using tools such as Datadog, Prometheus, Grafana, Cloud Watch, or Azure Monitor.
• Drive security-by-design across the delivery lifecycle including IAM, network architecture, secrets management, and compliance automation.
• Lead engineering teams ranging from small squads to 10+ person delivery teams, scaling leadership approach to the needs of each engagement.
• Mentor and develop engineers at all levels through code reviews, pairing, and design coaching.
• Operate as a trusted advisor to client technical leadership and executive stakeholders. Communicate trade-offs clearly and build confidence.
• Influence without direct authority — driving alignment across cross-functional teams through technical credibility and stakeholder management.
• Lead discovery and requirements elicitation, surfacing the underlying business need beyond the stated request.
• Produce clear written artifacts: technical proposals, architecture decision records, SOWs, and executive-level status communication.
• Grow client relationships and identify follow-on opportunities through proposal contributions and delivery-driven account expansion.
• Contribute to Launch's growth — practice development, thought…