AI Tech Lead — Innovation Lab

eGov Foundation; Bengaluru; On-site; INR 3,500,000 - 7,500,000; Full time

Job summary

eGov Foundation’s Innovation Lab seeks an AI Tech Lead to serve as the in-house technical owner, building and prototyping AI-driven solutions while directing external partners. The role combines hands-on engineering with clear governance, cross-functional coordination, and strong communication to leadership and public audiences.

The successful candidate will own reference architectures, drive reproducible prototypes, ensure transfer of knowledge, and uphold responsible-AI practices across

Qualifications

• Hands-on experience building with foundation models and LLMs.
• Experience with evaluating AI systems and responsible-AI practices.
• Proven ability to write and review high-quality code.
• Strong full-stack engineering across Java, Python, React, Flutter.
• Experience in vendor/delivery governance and API contracts.
• Public sector or govtech exposure is a bonus.

Responsibilities

• Hands-on AI-native engineering and prototype development.
• Define governance, acceptance criteria, and quality gates for partners.
• Communicate complex tech to non-technical audiences and leaders.
• Own reference architecture and IP transfer to internal teams.
• Ensure transfer readiness and knowledge transfer artefacts.
• Establish evaluation methods for quality, reliability, and latency.
• Participate in governance meetings and discuss architecture.

Skills

Hands-on AI/AI-native engineering

Full-stack engineering

Communication & representation

Vendor & delivery governance

Quality & tooling

Problem solving & independence

Tools

Claude

ChatGPT

Cursor

GitHub Copilot

REST API Design

Docker

Kubernetes

Java

Python

React

Flutter

OpenAPI/Swagger

Job description

The Innovation Lab applies and adapts AI to accelerate work across eGov’s spectrum of products and platform — DIGIT and the products built on it, including DIGIT HCM (Health Campaign Management). The Lab runs a continuous pipeline of experiments, taking validated problems through bounded prototypes to capabilities that eGov’s product teams can adopt. It applies foundation models and modern GenAI techniques to govtech problems; it does not build models from scratch, though it may tune or train lightly for specific use cases. The Lab’s output is handover-ready — evidence-backed, transferable capabilities, not systems the Lab runs itself.

The AI Tech Lead is eGov’s in-house technical owner for the Lab, and the single internal point of technical accountability. This is a hands-on role: the candidate is expected to build and prototype directly, and equally to direct, review and validate the work of external partners. The Tech Lead must be strong enough as an engineer to accept nothing they cannot themselves evaluate. Alongside the technical work, the role carries a significant communication mandate — articulating the Lab’s work across functions, to leadership, and in external and public forums.

Key Responsibilities

• Hands-on AI-native engineering: Build and prototype directly. Decide and implement the applied-AI approach per experiment — foundation-model selection, RAG, prompting and agentic patterns, adaptation and light tuning — and turn approved briefs into scoped, testable prototypes within agreed scope, sprint allocation and cost guardrails.
• Partner governance and technical validation: Own the technical scope, acceptance criteria and quality gates for partner-delivered work. Review, test and sign off architecture and code against agreed standards. Accept nothing without documentation, tests and reproducibility; prevent black-box delivery.
• Communication, articulation and representation: Explain technical concepts clearly to non-technical and senior audiences. Coordinate across eGov functions — product, engineering, delivery and country teams — to move experiments and handovers forward. Represent eGov and the Lab’s AI work in external and public forums, and in the wider open-source and DPG ecosystem.
• Architecture and IP ownership: Own the Lab’s reference architecture and reusable components on eGov’s behalf. Ensure design decisions, patterns and institutional knowledge are documented and held by eGov, and progressively insourced from partners rather than left with them.
• Handover-readiness and transfer: Guarantee every capability is transferable — reproducible prototype, evaluation evidence, documented limitations, assumptions, dependencies and technical debt. Own the integration charter and knowledge-transfer artefacts so work moves cleanly from the build partner to the integration partner and into the relevant product’s engineering team. Act as the technical continuity point across that chain.
• Evaluation and responsible AI: Establish evaluation methodology and reusable evaluation harnesses covering quality, reliability and latency. Own responsible-AI in application — bias, exclusion, privacy, human oversight and fallback, proportionate to risk. Hold experiments to inference and operating-cost discipline.
• Governance participation: Provide technical-feasibility input at iGate 0, evidence and architecture-review readiness at iGate 1, and represent the Lab technically at iGate 2. Chair sprint showcases.

Required Skills & Experience

1. Hands-on applied AI / AI-native engineering (core): Demonstrated ability to build with foundation models and LLMs — prompt engineering, RAG, agentic and orchestration patterns, adaptation, and fine-tuning or light training for specific use cases. Practical command of evaluation methodology for AI systems, responsible-AI practice, and cost/latency/quality trade-offs. Experience applying and adapting existing AI rather than researching or building models from scratch. Must be able to write and review high-quality, maintainable code, not only direct others.
2. Full-stack engineering: Strong hands-on experience across the stack — Java, Python, React and Flutter. Solid grounding in REST, microservices and API design; Postgres or similar SQL; Docker and Kubernetes; cloud (AWS/Azure); Git; and an in-depth understanding of design patterns.
3. Communication and representation: Strong articulation and presentation skills, with a track record of explaining technical work to senior leadership and mixed audiences; cross-functional coordination; and comfort representing an organization in external or public forums.
4. Vendor and delivery governance: Defining and managing technical scope and acceptance for managed-deliverables engagements; architecture review and sign-off; API contracts (OpenAPI / Swagger).
5. Quality and tooling: Evaluation and test-automation approaches for AI-enabled systems; AI-assisted development tools (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, GitHub Copilot) as an advantage.
6. Problem solving and disposition: Strong logical and analytical ability with pragmatic technical judgement; suited to a compact organization where teamwork and resourcefulness are valued; able to work independently without support staff and with minimal supervision. Prior exposure to the public sector, development sector, global health or govtech is an added advantage.

Position: AI Tech Lead — Innovation Lab

Position Type: Full Time

Reports to: Innovation Lab Lead

Department: AI & Innovation Lab

Experience: 6 to 10 years

About eGov Foundation & DIGIT

• Driving digital transformation globally: with our open-source platform, DIGIT (Digital Infrastructure for Governance, Impact, and Transformation), to empower nations on their journey towards modernized public services.
• Providing strategic guidance: to countries on harnessing digital public goods (DPGs) for the effective transformation of their digital services and governance.
• Fostering dynamic networks: that accelerate the adoption of digital solutions, facilitating exponential progress and innovation within governments and communities.

Our platform, DIGIT, has already benefited over 160 million citizens and continues to expand its reach, touching the lives of over 2.5 billion people worldwide. Practice areas we work in include local governance, public health, public finance, water, sanitation and climate. Our work spans across 10 countries globally and 2,600 towns and cities across 16 states in India.

If you’re passionate about revolutionizing public service delivery and enhancing the lives of billions, we’d love for you to join our team. Whether you are in a hands-on role or supporting from behind the scenes, your contributions are vital and impactful. Join us in making a transformative difference!

Why work with us?

• Make a Large Scale Impact: Contribute to projects with the potential to drive significant societal change. Gain experience tackling diverse challenges on both national and global stages.
• Learn from the Best: Receive mentorship from leading experts and professionals within our rich ecosystem, broadening your perspectives and expertise.
• Harness Technology for Good: Be part of a team dedicated to using technology to address real-world problems and enhance the lives of citizens.
• Grow and Lead: Develop essential skills and seize remarkable opportunities to lead initiatives that shape your career, all within an environment of innovation, collaboration, and excellence.

Read more about the work of eGov Global:

1. https://egov.global/