Lead AI Engineer (AI Foundations, LLM Core and Agentic AI)

Capital One; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 211,000 - 240,800; Full time

Job summary

A leading financial services firm is looking for a Lead AI Engineer in San Francisco, CA to design and implement AI solutions that transform customer interactions. You will collaborate with cross-functional teams to build efficient AI systems and apply advanced machine learning techniques. The ideal candidate has a strong technical background, with significant experience in AI and ML technologies, and programming skills in Python and related languages. Competitive salary and dynamic work environment offered.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of experience developing AI and ML algorithms or technologies.
• 4+ years of experience programming with Python, Go, Scala, or Java.

Responsibilities

• Deliver AI-powered products to change customer interactions.
• Design, develop, and support AI software components.
• Optimize large scale production AI systems.

Skills

Programming with Python

AI and ML algorithms

Cloud platforms

System design

Problem solving

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related fields

Master's degree in Computer Science or related fields

Tools

AWS

VectorDBs

PyTorch

Scala

Java

Job description

Lead AI Engineer (AI Foundations, LLM Core and Agentic AI)

Overview

At Capital One, we are creating responsible and reliable AI systems, changing banking for good. For years, Capital One has been an industry leader in using machine learning to create real-time, personalized customer experiences. Our investments in technology infrastructure and world-class talent – along with our deep experience in machine learning – position us to be at the forefront of enterprises leveraging AI. From informing customers about unusual charges to answering their questions in real time, our applications of AI & ML are bringing humanity and simplicity to banking. We are committed to continuing to build world‑class applied science and engineering teams to deliver our industry‑leading capabilities with breakthrough product experiences and scalable, high‑performance AI infrastructure. At Capital One, you will help bring the transformative power of emerging AI capabilities to reimagine how we serve our customers and businesses who have come to love the products and services we build.

Team Description

The Intelligent Foundations and Experiences (IFX) team is at the center of bringing our vision for AI at Capital One to life. We work hand-in-hand with our partners across the company to advance the state of the art in science and AI engineering, and we build and deploy proprietary solutions that are central to our business and deliver value to millions of customers. Our AI models and platforms empower teams across Capital One to enhance their products with the transformative power of AI, in responsible and scalable ways for the highest leverage impact.

In this role, you will:

• Partner with a cross‑functional team of engineers, research scientists, technical program managers, and product managers to deliver AI‑powered products that change how our associates work and how our customers interact with Capital One.
• Design, develop, test, deploy, and support AI software components including foundation model training, large language model inference, similarity search, guardrails, model evaluation, experimentation, governance, and observability, etc.
• Leverage a broad stack of Open Source and SaaS AI technologies such as AWS Ultraclusters, Huggingface, VectorDBs, Nemo Guardrails, PyTorch, and more.
• Invent and introduce state‑of‑the‑art LLM optimization techniques to improve the performance – scalability, cost, latency, throughput – of large scale production AI systems.
• Contribute to the technical vision and the long‑term roadmap of foundational AI systems at Capital One.

Ideal Candidate

• You love to build systems, take pride in the quality of your work, and also share our passion to do the right thing. You want to work on problems that will help change banking for good.
• Passion for staying abreast of the latest research, and an ability to intuitively understand scientific publications and judiciously apply novel techniques in production.
• You adapt quickly and thrive on bringing clarity to big, undefined problems. You love asking questions and digging deep to uncover the root of problems and can articulate your findings concisely with clarity. You have the courage to share new ideas even when they are unproven.
• You are deeply technical. You possess a strong foundation in engineering and mathematics, and your expertise in hardware, software, and AI enable you to see and exploit optimization opportunities that others miss.
• You are a resilient trailblazer who can forge new paths to achieve business goals when the route is unknown.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, AI, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related fields plus at least 4 years of experience developing AI and ML algorithms or technologies, or a Master's degree in Computer Science, AI, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or related fields plus at least 2 years of experience developing AI and ML algorithms or technologies.
• At least 4 years of experience programming with Python, Go, Scala, or Java.

Preferred Qualifications

• 6 years of experience deploying scalable and responsible AI solutions on cloud platforms (e.g. AWS, Google Cloud, Azure, or equivalent private cloud).
• Experience designing, developing, delivering, and supporting AI services.
• Experience developing AI and ML algorithms or technologies (e.g. LLM inference, similarity search and VectorDBs, guardrails, memory) using Python, C++, C#, Java, or Golang.
• Experience developing and applying state‑of‑the‑art techniques for optimizing training and inference software to improve hardware utilization, latency, throughput, and cost.
• Passion for staying abreast of the latest AI research and AI systems, and judiciously applying novel techniques in production.

Capital One will consider sponsoring a new qualified applicant for employment authorization for this position.

The minimum and maximum full-time annual salaries for this role are listed below, by location. Please note that this salary information is solely for candidates hired to perform work within one of these locations, and refers to the amount Capital One is willing to pay at the time of this posting. Salaries for part‑time roles will be prorated based upon the agreed upon number of hours to be regularly worked.

Cambridge, MA: $193,400 - $220,700 for Lead AI Engineer

McLean, VA: $193,400 - $220,700 for Lead AI Engineer

New York, NY: $211,000 - $240,800 for Lead AI Engineer

San Francisco, CA: $211,000 - $240,800 for Lead AI Engineer

San Jose, CA: $211,000 - $240,800 for Lead AI Engineer

Capital One is an equal opportunity employer (EOE, including disability/vet) committed to non‑discrimination in compliance with applicable federal, state, and local laws. Capital One promotes a drug‑free workplace. Capital One will consider for employment qualified applicants with a criminal history in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable laws regarding criminal background inquiries.