Principal AI Infrastructure Architect

Mastercard; Atlanta (GA); On-site; USD 170,000 - 281,000; Full time

Job summary

Mastercard is seeking a Principal AI Platform Engineer to lead the AI Infrastructure roadmap for its on-prem private cloud, building scalable systems for training and inference across global workloads. The role requires deep knowledge of compute, storage, networking, and AI lifecycle.

You will partner with data science, MLOps, and platform teams to ensure responsible AI and strong governance. The candidate will influence senior leadership, drive vendor evaluations, and stay ahead of Generative

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Electronics, or related field.
• Experience in large-scale infrastructure, platform engineering, or systems architecture in a complex enterprise.
• Proven experience owning infrastructure roadmaps and delivery in on premise/private cloud.
• Good working knowledge of AI/ML concepts, data science workflows, MLOps, and model lifecycle management.
• Familiarity with Generative AI and Agentic AI architectures and their infrastructure needs.
• Deep understanding of compute (CPU/GPU), storage, and networking for AI platforms.
• Hands-on or architectural exposure to high density, high power AI infrastructure including cooling and power design.
• Strong product thinking to balance user needs, feasibility, cost, and evolution.
• Experience running RFIs/RFPs and partnering with sourcing/finance for investments.
• Able to navigate a large matrix organization with security, governance, and compliance stakeholders.
• Executive-ready communicator to present complex topics to senior leaders.
• Strategic, data-driven, and willing to challenge assumptions with well-reasoned design decisions.
• Curious and forward-looking mindset to build enterprise-scale AI foundations.

Responsibilities

• Lead AI infrastructure roadmap for Mastercard’s on premise private cloud, covering strategy, design, procurement, delivery and lifecycle management.
• Act as a product owner for AI infrastructure, translating data science needs into scalable platform capabilities for ML and generative AI workloads.
• Lead RFIs/RFPs for AI infrastructure components, defining criteria and driving vendor selections with cross-functional teams.
• Architect and scale infrastructure to train large-scale models on petabytes of data with low-latency real-time and batch inference.
• Define and champion modern AI infrastructure standards including high-performance storage, fast networking, and data center design considerations.
• Collaborate with data science, MLOps, and platform teams to align infrastructure with model development, training, deployment and observability.
• Work with security, governance, architecture, and compliance to meet regulatory and ethical AI standards.
• Influence senior leadership with clear trade-offs, ROI, and risk arguments through structured narratives.
• Stay ahead of industry trends in AI infrastructure, Generative AI, and Agentic AI to inform long-term strategy.

Skills

AI infrastructure

private cloud

RFIs/RFPs

vendor evaluation

scale training/inference

latency optimization

cross-functional collaboration

executive communication

MLOps

data science collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Electronics, or related engineering field

Tools

CPU/GPU hardware

High performance storage

Networking

Liquid cooling

Job description

Mastercard is seeking a Principal AI Platform Engineer to lead the AI Infrastructure roadmap for its on-prem private cloud, building scalable systems for training and inference across global workloads. The role requires deep knowledge of compute, storage, networking, and AI lifecycle.

You will partner with data science, MLOps, and platform teams to ensure responsible AI and strong governance. The candidate will influence senior leadership, drive vendor evaluations, and stay ahead of Generative