Principal Software Engineer, AI & Data Platform

Base Camp Recruitment Pte Ltd; Singapore; Hybrid; SGD 198,000 - 242,000; Full time

Job summary

Base Camp Recruitment Pte Ltd on behalf of a technology partner seeks a Principal Software Engineer, AI & Data Platform in Singapore with a strong focus on data and AI systems. You will lead architecture for scalable ML workflows and production-grade AI applications.

This hands-on leadership role requires solving difficult engineering problems, setting technical direction, and delivering impactful AI systems in a fast-moving product environment.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related discipline.
• 10+ years in production software systems design and delivery.
• Expert-level Python development for scalable backend platforms.
• Deep experience with large-scale data engineering and ML-ready datasets.
• Hands-on ML pipelines for training, evaluation, and improvements.
• Experience training AI models for structured outputs and automation.
• Strong knowledge of relational, document, and columnar databases.
• Experience with cloud-native data platforms and distributed compute.
• Proven architectural decision-making in early-stage products.
• Excellent communication to influence across teams.

Responsibilities

• Architect scalable data platforms for large scientific and engineering data, ensuring reliable, reusable, ML-ready datasets.
• Design domain-specific data models supporting analytics, automation, and ML workloads.
• Build high-performance data pipelines across storage, analytics platforms, and training datasets.
• Develop ML data pipelines for ingestion, curation, deduplication, feature prep, evaluation datasets, and regression tracking.
• Build and operate model training and fine-tuning pipelines for production AI applications.
• Design intelligent workflow orchestration connecting user intent with platform capabilities via AI-driven automation.
• Establish evaluation frameworks, benchmarking methods, automated scoring, and AI model quality monitoring.
• Define engineering best practices across data and AI platforms, creating reusable frameworks and standards.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to deliver scalable, production-grade AI systems.

Skills

Python

Data engineering

ML pipelines

Cloud platforms

Architectural decisions

Communication

Distributed compute

Backend design

Education

BSc/MSc in CS/Software Eng

Tools

Python

Job description

Principal Software Engineer, AI & Data Platform

Singapore (Hybrid)
Permanent
Salary: Up to SGD 220,000 per annum

We're partnering with an innovative technology company building next-generation AI-powered platforms for complex scientific and engineering applications. They are looking for a Principal Software Engineer, AI & Data Platform to lead the architecture of their data and AI engineering foundation, enabling scalable machine learning systems and intelligent workflows.

This is a highly hands-on technical leadership role for someone who enjoys solving difficult engineering problems while setting technical direction in a fast-moving, product-focused environment.

What You'll Do

• Architect scalable data platforms capable of processing large volumes of scientific and engineering data, ensuring datasets remain reliable, reusable, and ML-ready.
• Design domain-specific data models that support analytics, automation, and machine learning workloads.
• Build high-performance data pipelines across object storage, analytical data platforms, and training-optimised datasets.
• Develop and maintain ML data pipelines covering data ingestion, curation, deduplication, feature preparation, evaluation datasets, and regression tracking.
• Build and operate model training and fine-tuning pipelines for production AI applications.
• Design intelligent workflow orchestration that connects user intent with platform capabilities through reliable AI-driven automation.
• Establish robust evaluation frameworks, benchmarking methodologies, automated scoring, and quality monitoring for AI models.
• Define engineering best practices across data and AI platforms, creating reusable frameworks, documentation, and technical standards.
• Work closely with cross-functional engineering teams to deliver scalable, production-grade AI systems.

What We're Looking For

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related discipline.
• 10+ years of experience designing and delivering production software systems.
• Expert-level Python development with a strong track record of building scalable backend platforms.
• Deep experience with large-scale data engineering, including object storage, analytical processing, distributed data pipelines, and training-optimised data formats.
• Hands-on experience building ML pipelines for model training, fine-tuning, evaluation, and continuous improvement.
• Experience fine-tuning or training AI models for structured outputs, workflow automation, tool usage, or domain-specific applications.
• Strong understanding of relational, document, and columnar database technologies and when to apply each.
• Experience working with cloud-native data platforms and distributed compute environments.
• Proven ability to make sound architectural decisions and thrive in ambiguous, early-stage product environments.
• Strong communication skills with the ability to influence technical direction across engineering teams.

Nice to Have

• Experience applying machine learning to scientific, engineering, manufacturing, chemistry, materials, or simulation data.
• Experience with retrieval-augmented systems, knowledge graphs, hybrid search, or structured retrieval techniques.
• Experience designing APIs or platform interfaces for AI agents and intelligent workflows.
• Familiarity with workflow orchestration platforms and large-scale production ML infrastructure.
• Contributions to open-source projects in AI, data engineering, or scientific computing.