Artificial Intelligence Engineer

Innova Recruitment; United Kingdom; Remote; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading recruitment agency is seeking a Senior AI Engineer to develop and productionise NLP and LLM-based solutions. This fully remote role is ideal for candidates with strong experience in AI model development, mentoring, and collaboration within technical teams. You will take ownership of the AI function and shape standards while supporting junior engineers.

Qualifications

• Experience as an AI or Machine Learning Engineer with end-to-end model responsibility.
• Strong knowledge of NLP and LLMs, including transformers and fine-tuning.
• Familiarity with MLOps practices and model registry processes.

Responsibilities

• Design and develop NLP and LLM-based systems for internal products.
• Evaluate models and recommend new techniques.
• Mentor and guide junior engineers.

Skills

NLP and LLMs expertise

Containerization (Docker/Kubernetes)

End-to-end model development

Mentoring junior engineers

CI/CD processes

Job description

Introduction

This range is provided by Innova Recruitment. Your actual pay will be based on your skills and experience — talk with your recruiter to learn more.

Base pay range

Direct message the job poster from Innova Recruitment

Co‑Founder & Director | 15+ Years in Tech Recruitment | Building High‑Performing Engineering, Data & IT Teams Across the UK & USA

Fully Remote - UK based only.

Do you want to have the chance to take ownership of a growing AI function and influence both the technical direction and long‑term capability of a team?

You will join at a point where the foundations are still being shaped, which gives you space to design systems, introduce standards and lead key decisions.

You will also mentor junior engineers who are already in place, giving you a clear leadership path. The work involves varied challenges across research, applied engineering and production deployment, with an environment that supports autonomy and technical depth.

Our client builds data‑driven products that rely on large volumes of text‑based information. They are expanding their AI capability and are hiring a Senior AI Engineer to take the lead in developing and productionising advanced NLP and LLM‑based solutions.

The Senior AI Engineer will be responsible for designing, building and deploying AI systems, with a focus on text processing, NLP and LLMs. You will work across research and implementation, taking models from concept to production, setting technical standards and supporting junior engineers.

The role involves close collaboration with the AI, MLOps and Data Engineering teams, contributing to the wider technical strategy and ensuring models are reliable, maintainable and scalable.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and develop NLP and LLM‑based systems for internal products and workflows.
• Evaluate new models, techniques and approaches, recommending what should be adopted.
• Fine‑tune and adapt foundation models using domain‑specific datasets.
• Carry out analysis to understand model behaviour, drift and explainability.
• Build and maintain tools for evaluation, prompt testing and dataset preparation.
• Work with the MLOps engineer to deploy, monitor and retrain models in production.
• Support CI/CD processes for AI, including version control, reproducibility and rollback workflows.
• Provide mentorship and guidance to junior engineers.
• Collaborate with product and engineering teams to integrate AI functionality into the platform.

Required Experience

• Experience as an AI or Machine Learning Engineer with responsibility for end‑to‑end model development and deployment.
• Strong knowledge of NLP and LLMs (transformers, fine‑tuning, retrieval‑augmented methods, agents).
• Experience conducting applied research and converting experimental outcomes into production systems.
• Familiarity with retraining workflows and performance monitoring.
• Understanding of explainability and fairness techniques.
• Hands‑on experience with containerisation and orchestration (Docker/Kubernetes).
• Understanding of MLOps practices, CI/CD and model registry processes.
• Experience mentoring or guiding junior engineers or leading technical initiatives.

Nice to Have

• Experience working with sensitive or regulated data (not essential).
• Experience with graph‑based retrieval.
• Familiarity with Azure ML or similar tooling.

Career Path and Growth

You will act as the senior figure within the AI group, shaping standards, guiding junior colleagues and influencing long‑term technical decisions. Over time, this may evolve into broader leadership responsibilities as the team expands. The role suits someone who wants a balance of hands‑on engineering, technical ownership and mentoring.

Seniority Level

Mid‑Senior level

Employment Type

Full‑time

Job Function

Information Technology, Engineering, and Science