AI Engineer II

Hinge Health; San Francisco (CA); Hybrid; USD 170,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

401k with company match

Learning and development stipend

Employee stock purchase plan

Job summary

Hinge Health is seeking an AI Engineer to join our Proactive Communications & Notifications team in San Francisco. You’ll build and operate backend systems that power AI-enabled member communications, partnering with ML Scientists and engineers to design APIs, services, and data flows for reliable production use.

You’ll bring strong backend software engineering, production ownership, and experience with distributed systems.

Qualifications

• 2+ years of full-time software engineering experience.
• Experience building and operating backend services in production.
• Proficiency with at least one production programming language such as Python, TypeScript/JavaScript, Go, Java, Kotlin, or a comparable language.

Responsibilities

• Develop and operate backend services for AI-powered features.
• Design APIs, services, and data workflows for reliable production use.
• Collaborate with ML scientists, data engineers, and product teams.

Skills

Backend systems

APIs & workflows

Python/JS/Go/Java

Observability & testing

Tools

AWS

Docker

Kafka

PostgreSQL

Kubernetes

Job description

The Opportunity

Join the Proactive Communications & Notifications team as we build the systems that help Hinge Health determine what message a member receives, when they receive it, and which channel is most helpful. Our work brings together distributed backend services, data flows, and machine learning and AI capabilities to make member communication more relevant, timely, and actionable.

As an AI Engineer, you’ll build and operate the backend systems that bring AI-powered product capabilities to members. You’ll partner with senior engineers, ML Scientists, Data Engineering, Product, and other software engineers to design APIs, services, workflows, and data flows that are reliable in production.

This role is a strong fit for a backend-leaning software engineer who wants to apply distributed-systems skills to AI products. You’ll help integrate, deploy, and operate models and AI services within product systems; model training and research are not the primary focus. MLOps experience is valuable, but the core expectation is strong software engineering, production execution, and operational ownership.

What You’ll Accomplish

In your first 3 months

• Learn the Proactive Communications & Notifications domain, service architecture, operational practices, and member-impact goals.

• Ship well-scoped improvements to APIs, services, asynchronous jobs, or workflows with guidance from senior engineers.

• Build familiarity with the team’s testing, observability, deployment, and incident-response practices; participate in on-call or incident support as appropriate.

In your first 6 months

• Own a medium-sized feature from planning through implementation, testing, rollout, and follow-up with minimal support.

• Integrate an ML- or AI-backed capability into a product workflow through clear interfaces, reliable data flows, and appropriate failure handling.

• Improve the correctness and operability of distributed systems by applying patterns such as retries, idempotency, versioning, graceful degradation, dashboards, and structured logging.

In your first year

• Deliver multiple production initiatives that improve the relevance, timeliness, reliability, or maintainability of member communications.

• Trace and resolve issues across APIs, services, queues, databases, model-backed components, and data dependencies, raising risks and decisions early.

• Help strengthen the team through thoughtful code reviews, design documentation, pairing, onboarding support, and contributions to engineering practices.

Who You Are

• You are a backend-minded software engineer who enjoys building reliable systems and learning how they behave in production.

• You can take a well-scoped problem from design through launch, break work into incremental changes, and ask for direction when complexity or ambiguity increases.

• You demonstrate effective communication through clear design notes, concise status updates, thoughtful code reviews, and early escalation of risks.

• You are a learn-it-all who welcomes feedback, builds depth in your primary technologies, and develops the judgment to make sound tradeoffs.

• You practice accountability by owning the quality, reliability, and follow-through of the systems you build.

• You lead at all levels: you are hands-on in the details, contribute to a positive team culture, and help teammates succeed through collaboration and knowledge sharing.

Basic Qualifications

• 2+ years of non-internship, full-time professional software engineering experience.

• Experience building and operating backend services or distributed systems in production, including APIs, asynchronous processing, event-driven systems, workflows, or data-intensive services.

• Professional experience with at least one production programming language such as Python, TypeScript/JavaScript, Go, Java, Kotlin, or a comparable language, plus experience with software testing, observability, deployment, or production support.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience integrating ML- or AI-backed services into production products.

• Experience with AWS or another cloud platform and technologies such as Docker, Kafka, PostgreSQL, or equivalent systems.

• Experience with asynchronous processing, workflow orchestration, event-driven systems, or long-running state.

• Familiarity with CI/CD, service monitoring, model deployment, inference, or model versioning.

• Experience with Temporal, Step Functions, Kubernetes, Airflow, or comparable systems.

• Experience with generative AI, LLMs, retrieval, agents, or evaluation systems.

• Experience working in healthcare, digital health, fintech, or another regulated or data-sensitive domain.

Hinge Health Hybrid Model

This is a hybrid role based in the San Francisco office, requiring in-person attendance three days per week for a full 8-hour business day. On remote days, employees are expected to work during core business hours with flexibility. The office is part of a dog-friendly workplace program.

About Hinge Health

At Hinge Health, we’re using technology to scale and automate the delivery of healthcare – starting with musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions, which affect over 1.7 billion people worldwide.

With an AI-powered human-centered care model, Hinge Health leverages cutting-edge technology to improve outcomes, experiences and costs to help people move beyond their pain.

The platform addresses a broad spectrum of MSK care – from acute injury, to chronic pain, to post-surgical rehabilitation – through personalized, evidence-based care.

As the preferred partner to 60+ health plans, PBMs and other ecosystem partners, Hinge Health is available to over 20 million people across more than 2,800 employers.

The company is headquartered in San Francisco with additional offices in Montreal and Bangalore.

Learn more at hingehealth.com.

What You’ll Love About Us

• Inclusive healthcare and benefits: On top of comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage, we offer employees and their family members help with gender-affirming care, tools for family and fertility planning, and travel reimbursements if healthcare isn’t available where you live.

• Planning for the future: Start saving for the future with our traditional or Roth 401k retirement plan options, which include a 2% company match.

• Modern life stipends: Manage your own learning and development.

• Grow with us: Grow with us through discounted company stock through our ESPP with easy payroll deductions.

Culture & Engagement

Hinge Health is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any kind.

We make employment decisions without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, veteran status, disability status, pregnancy, or any other basis protected by federal, state, or local law.

We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements.

We provide reasonable accommodations for candidates with disabilities. If you feel you need assistance or an accommodation due to a disability, let us know by reaching out to your recruiter.

By submitting your application, you acknowledge that we use your personal data as outlined in the personnel and candidate privacy policy.