Senior Software Engineer I

UnitedHealth Group; Hyderabad; On-site; Confidential; Full time

Job summary

UnitedHealth Group, via Optum, seeks an AI/ML-focused backend engineer in Hyderabad to design and implement RAG-based AI systems. You will work with Python, Azure OpenAI services, and modern backend frameworks to build scalable services and AI workflows.

You will contribute to cloud-native architectures, SI/CI pipelines, and cross-functional collaboration, while advancing production-grade AI capabilities across the platform.

Qualifications

• Strong Python coding skills and backend experience.
• Extensive experience with GenAI and AI workflow design.
• Hands-on Azure Cloud experience focused on OpenAI, embeddings and LLMs.
• Familiar with building scalable backend services and CI/CD pipelines.
• Knowledge of tokenization, embeddings, vector stores and retrieval systems.
• Experience with RAG concepts, tool-use, and autonomous agent frameworks.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain RAG-based AI systems using Python and Azure AI services.
• Build backend services using FastAPI, Flask, and Quart with scalable design.
• Develop interactive UIs using React, npm, and Next.js.
• Implement AI workflows using Azure OpenAI, Azure AI Search, Cosmos DB and Storage.
• Design AI agents including autonomous task agents and LLM function-calling.
• Write clean Python for data ingestion, embeddings, and retrieval logic.
• Contribute to architecture discussions for fault-tolerant production systems.
• Improve observability, performance, and CI/CD practices.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with product and cloud engineering teams.
• Contribute to Java-based services via Spring Boot within the platform.

Skills

Python

GenAI

Azure Cloud

Backend microservices

CI/CD DevOps

Tools

Azure OpenAI

Azure AI Search

Cosmos DB

Azure Storage Account

Azure App Services/Functions

Spring Boot (Java)

Job description

Optum is a global organization that delivers care, aided by technology to help millions of people live healthier lives. The work you do with our team will directly improve health outcomes by connecting people with the care, pharmacy benefits, data and resources they need to feel their best. Here, you will find a culture guided by inclusion, talented peers, comprehensive benefits and career development opportunities. Come make an impact on the communities we serve as you help us advance health optimization on a global scale. Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Design, develop, and maintain RAG-based AI systems using Python and Azure AI services
• Build backend services using FastAPI, Flask, and Quart, with an emphasis on modular, scalable design
• Develop interactive UIs using React, npm, and Next.js
• Implement and optimize AI workflows using Azure OpenAI (LLMs), Azure AI Search, Cosmos DB, Storage Accounts, and related Azure-native components
• Design and build AI agents, including autonomous task agents, tool-using agents, and LLM function-calling architectures
• Write clean, maintainable, and efficient Python code for data ingestion, embedding pipelines, prompt flows, vector interactions, and retrieval logic
• Participate in architecture discussions to design fault-tolerant, production-grade AI systems
• Contribute to best practices related to observability, performance, scalability, and CI/CD
• Collaborate cross-functionally with product and cloud engineering teams to implement new features
• Contribute to Java-based services built using Spring Boot as part of the broader platform ecosystem
• Comply with the terms and conditions of the employment contract, company policies and procedures, and any and all directives (such as, but not limited to, transfer and/or re-assignment to different work locations, change in teams and/or work shifts, policies in regards to flexibility of work benefits and/or work environment, alternative work arrangements, and other decisions that may arise due to the changing business environment). The Company may adopt, vary or rescind these policies and directives in its absolute discretion and without any limitation (implied or otherwise) on its ability to do so

Required Qualifications:

• Core Programming & Backend
• Extensive experience using GenAI
• Solid proficiency in Python
• Cloud & DevOps
• Hands-on experience with Azure Cloud, particularly:
• Azure OpenAI (LLMs, embeddings)
• Azure AI Search
• Cosmos DB
• Azure Storage Account
• Azure App Services / Functions
• AI/ML Concepts
• Candidates should be familiar with key AI fundamentals, including but not limited to:
• AI / LLM Concepts
• Tokenization, embeddings, and vector stores
• Prompt engineering & prompt chaining
• Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) principles
• Model fine-tuning vs. prompt-adaptation
• Context windows, grounding, hallucination management
• Knowledge distillation, model evaluation metricsLLM function calling and tool-use
• Autonomous agent frameworks and agentic workflows
• MLOps / AI Engineering Concepts
• Data ingestion pipelines
• Embedding generation & indexing
• Monitoring of AI system performance
• Caching strategies and latency optimization

Preferred Qualification:

• Azure DevOps or GitHub Actions

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone-of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income-deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes - an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.