AI Engineer JN -092026-180980

Goodwin Recruiting; San Bruno (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Health benefits

401k

In-office 2 days/week (San Mateo)

Job summary

Goodwin Recruiting is seeking an AI Engineer for a growing early-stage defense-tech startup. You will own the ML lifecycle from data wrangling to production-grade models, with emphasis on edge deployment and robust inference for mission-critical workflows.

Ideal candidates have a CS degree and hands-on experience with PyTorch, TensorFlow, and Hugging Face, plus cloud platform exposure and willingness to travel up to 15% for DoD engagements.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related field.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals.
• Solid ML principles with model evaluation and optimization.
• Hands-on with ML frameworks and production ML systems.

Responsibilities

• Design, train, fine-tune, and deploy ML models for real-world problems.
• Build scalable data pipelines for structured and unstructured data.
• Integrate models into production systems with testing and CI/CD.
• Prototype and benchmark new modeling approaches for performance.

Skills

Software engineering

ML fundamentals

PyTorch

TensorFlow

Hugging Face

Data cleaning

Feature engineering

Production ML

CI/CD

Edge deployment

AWS

GCP

Azure

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

PyTorch

TensorFlow

Hugging Face

Job description

A growing early-stage startup are looking for an AI Engineer.

The startup uses AI to Draft and Develop war plans for their Aerospace/Defense partners. They're on a mission to ensure warfighters are prepared for every challenge they face. They build AI-native software for mission-critical workflows — empowering warfighters with adaptive, intelligent technology designed for the pace and complexity of modern conflict.

This is an opportunity to join at the earliest stage and build systems that matter. This role is ideal for someone who thrives in a hands-on environment, enjoys solving complex data problems, and wants to push the state-of-the-art in applied AI for defense. You will work across the full ML lifecycle — transforming messy, real-world data into production-grade models deployed in high-stakes environments.

Key Responsibilities

• AI/ML Development: Design, train, fine-tune, and deploy state-of-the-art ML models to solve real-world operational problems. Own the lifecycle from data exploration and feature engineering to evaluation and production monitoring.
• Data & Systems Engineering: Build scalable data pipelines for structured and unstructured data (text, imagery, geospatial, sensor data). Develop reliable training and inference systems optimized for performance and edge deployment.
• Engineering Excellence: Integrate models into robust, scalable production systems with strong testing, observability, and CI/CD practices.
• Research & Experimentation: Prototype and benchmark new modeling approaches (LLMs, multimodal systems, RAG) to improve performance, robustness, and mission impact.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree (B.Sc.) in Computer Science or related field.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals.
• Solid understanding of machine learning principles (model evaluation, optimization, bias/variance tradeoffs).
• Hands-on experience with ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, Hugging Face).
• Experience working with real-world datasets — cleaning, feature engineering, experimentation, and performance analysis.
• Experience deploying ML systems into production environments.
• Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure) and modern deployment workflows.
• Strong problem-solving ability and comfort operating in ambiguity.
• Willingness to travel up to 15% to engage with DoD partners.
• Must be eligible to obtain and maintain a U.S. security clearance

Salary: 150-200k base + Equity

Full Health Benefits + 401k

In office at least 2-days a week in San Mateo***

Prince Agyemang