AI Engineering Lead

Reply; United Kingdom; On-site; GBP 70,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading technology company based in the United Kingdom seeks an experienced AI Engineering Lead to spearhead the engineering delivery of their AI platform. The ideal candidate will possess robust technical leadership and hands-on experience in producing scalable AI systems. Responsibilities include guiding teams in deploying AI solutions and implementing MLOps best practices. Candidates should have a degree in a related field and significant experience in Python and cloud platforms.

Qualifications

• Min BSc degree (2.1 or higher) in a relevant STEM field.
• 3+ years of experience in Python and AI/ML applications.
• Expertise in large language models and related frameworks.

Responsibilities

• Build and deploy advanced AI solutions using Python and agentic frameworks.
• Design and manage AI workloads on leading cloud platforms.
• Implement MLOps practices including CI/CD pipelines.

Skills

Python

AI/ML Applications

Cloud Platforms

DevOps/MLOps

System Design

Education

BSc degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or related STEM field

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

AWS

Azure

GCP

Job description

Overview

AI Engineering Lead Glue Reply is the outcome-focused Architecture specialist within the Reply Group. Through services encompassing Business Change/Transformation, Strategy & Architecture, Data exploitation and Integration, Glue Reply helps its clients succeed by turning strategy into tangible solutions and vision into practical outcomes. Glue Reply diagnoses the challenges and advises on the way to make real impact - enabling its clients to deliver. www.glue.reply.com

Role Overview

As an AI Engineering Lead, you will own the engineering delivery of our AI platform and client solutions. This role requires strong technical leadership combined with the ability to design, build, and ship production-grade AI systems. You will lead by example, remaining hands-on in coding, architecture, and deployment, while enabling the team to deliver high-impact projects.

Responsibilities

• Build, and deploy advanced AI solutions using Python and agentic frameworks such as LangChain, LlamaIndex, and related tools.
• Design and manage AI workloads on leading cloud platforms, leveraging services like SageMaker, Lambda, Azure ML, and cloud-native storage solutions.
• Implement and maintain MLOps best practices, including CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code (Terraform, Kubernetes, Docker), and ML lifecycle automation using tools like MLflow, Kubeflow, and Airflow.
• Drive observability, monitoring, and performance optimization for deployed AI systems.
• Provide technical leadership and mentorship to AI engineering teams, ensuring adherence to design patterns, coding standards, and best practices in AI and agentic development.
• Collaborate closely with product managers, solution architects, and client stakeholders to align technical solutions with business objectives and client requirements.
• Continuously monitor and evaluate industry trends in large language models (LLMs), agentic frameworks, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and GenAI tooling to maintain technological leadership.
• Identify and champion new opportunities for AI adoption and enablement across the organization, fostering a culture of innovation and technical excellence.

Qualifications

• A minimum of a BSc degree (2.1 or higher) in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or a related STEM field.
• Strong coding background in Python (3+ years), with demonstrated experience building and deploying production-grade AI/ML applications.
• Deep hands-on expertise with large language models (LLMs), LangChain, LlamaIndex, vector databases, and API integrations.
• Proven track record of working with major cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP), deploying and managing AI workloads in production environments.
• Solid understanding of DevOps/MLOps practices, including CI/CD, containerisation, and orchestration using tools such as Docker and Kubernetes.
• Experience in leading and mentoring small-to-medium engineering teams, effectively balancing technical delivery with team development.
• Strong problem-solving and system design skills, with experience architecting scalable and distributed AI systems.

Reply is an Equal Opportunities Employer and committed to embracing diversity in the workplace. We provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type regardless of age, sexual orientation, gender, identity, pregnancy, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, disability, medical history, skin colour, marital status or parental status or any other characteristic protected by the Law.

Reply is committed to making sure that our selection methods are fair to everyone. To help you during the recruitment process, please let us know of any Reasonable Adjustments you may need.