Principal AI Systems Engineer- Agentic and Productivity Systems

Adobe; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 249,000 - 361,000; Full time

Job summary

Adobe’s Creative Cloud Engineering team seeks a Senior AI Systems Engineer to design, orchestrate, and operationalize agent-based AI systems that boost developer productivity and reliability. You’ll build durable AI-native infrastructure, focusing on production-grade workflows, observability, and scalable platform solutions across CI/CD and tooling.

Ideal candidates blend systems engineering with hands-on AI integration and a pragmatic, production-first mindset.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of software engineering experience with systems-level focus.
• Strong experience in Python, Go, or TypeScript.
• Experience building distributed systems or infrastructure services.
• Experience integrating LLMs/AI into production.
• Experience evaluating multiple AI providers with cost optimization and capacity planning.
• Strong observability, metrics, logging, and tracing.
• Experience operating production services at scale.

Responsibilities

• Design and prototype agent-based systems for engineering workflows (CI diagnostics, code review automation).
• Develop multi-agent orchestration patterns with memory and control boundaries.
• Evaluate emerging AI frameworks and developer AI platforms in real-world environments.
• Build reusable orchestration layers and service architectures for AI-powered engineering systems.
• Create evaluation pipelines including trace-based testing for agent behavior.
• Implement observability, tracing, cost controls for AI services.
• Ensure reliability and measurable impact of AI-powered systems.
• Define internal standards for AI experimentation, deployment, and monitoring.
• Collaborate with DevEx, CI/CD, and platform teams to embed AI-native capabilities.
• Prevent tool sprawl by building cohesive, reusable AI productivity infrastructure.

Skills

Python

Go

TypeScript

Distributed systems

LLMs integration

AI providers evaluation

Observability

Production scale

CI/CD tooling

Tools

LangGraph

AutoGen

CrewAI

Embeddings

Vector databases

RAG architectures

Build systems

Job description

The Opportunity

The Creative Cloud Engineering organization is building the next generation of AI-powered engineering infrastructure to accelerate developer productivity and operational excellence across the Creative Cloud ecosystem. As we expand into AI-driven workflows across developer productivity and platform initiatives, we are looking for a Senior AI Systems Engineer who operates at the intersection of experimentation and production systems. This role focuses on designing, orchestrating, and operationalizing agent-based systems that improve engineering workflows across CI/CD, developer tooling, and operational diagnostics. This is not a research role and not a prompt-engineering role. This is a systems engineering role focused on building durable infrastructure. You will help build AI-native engineering capabilities that compound engineering velocity across Creative Cloud over time.

What You’ll Do

Agentic Workflow Development

• Design and prototype agent-based systems for engineering workflows such as CI diagnostics, code review automation, build failure triage, and autonomous debugging
• Develop multi-agent orchestration patterns with structured state, memory, and control boundaries
• Rapidly evaluate emerging AI frameworks, agent tooling, and developer AI platforms in real-world engineering environments

AI Systems Infrastructure

• Build reusable orchestration layers and service architectures for AI-powered engineering systems
• Develop structured evaluation pipelines including trace-based evaluation and regression testing for agent behavior
• Implement feedback loops and instrumentation that continuously improve AI system performance

Production Hardening

• Convert experimental workflows into secure, scalable, production-grade services
• Implement observability, tracing, cost controls, and model routing
• Ensure reliability, operational stability, and measurable impact of AI-powered systems

Platform Strategy & Collaboration

• Define internal standards for AI experimentation, evaluation, deployment, and monitoring
• Partner with DevEx, CI/CD, and platform teams across Creative Cloud to embed AI-native capabilities
• Build cohesive infrastructure that prevents tool sprawl and enables reusable AI productivity systems across teams

What Success Looks Like

• Production-grade AI agents integrated into engineering workflows and CI systems
• A standardized evaluation and tracing framework adopted across Creative Cloud engineering teams
• Measurable reductions in manual debugging, failure triage, and operational friction
• Reusable AI infrastructure components leveraged across multiple engineering teams
• A clear AI productivity roadmap aligned with Creative Cloud platform initiatives

Required Qualifications

• 8+ years of software engineering experience, with demonstrated depth in systems-level work
• Strong systems engineering experience (Python, Go, TypeScript, or similar)
• Experience building distributed systems, developer platforms, or infrastructure services
• Experience integrating LLMs or AI APIs into production systems
• Experience evaluating and integrating across multiple AI providers (e.g., AWS Bedrock, Anthropic, OpenAI) including cost optimization and capacity planning
• Strong understanding of observability, metrics, logging, and tracing systems
• Experience operating production services at scale

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with agent frameworks (LangGraph, AutoGen, CrewAI, or similar)
• Experience with embeddings, vector databases, or RAG architectures
• Experience designing evaluation and benchmarking systems for AI workflows
• Experience with CI/CD platforms, developer tooling, or build systems
• Experience building internal developer productivity platforms
• Familiarity with cost-aware model orchestration and multi-model routing

Ideal Candidate Profile

• Has built and shipped an AI-powered system end-to-end, not just integrated an API
• Can show a prototype they took from experiment to production
• Comfortable making infrastructure decisions with incomplete information
• Has debugged LLM reliability issues in production (latency, cost, failure modes, concurrency limits)
• Experimental but pragmatic — prototypes quickly, productionizes effectively
• Focused on measurable engineering productivity impact, not technology for its own sake

Why This Role Matters

AI is transforming how software is built. This role will help establish AI-native engineering infrastructure across Creative Cloud, enabling developers to build, test, and operate software more efficiently.

By turning early experimentation into durable platform capabilities, this role will drive long-term improvements in engineering productivity and operational excellence across Adobe.

This role is foundational to building long-term AI leverage across the organization.

About Adobe

Adobe empowers everyone to create through innovative platforms and tools that unleash creativity, productivity and personalized customer experiences. Adobe’s industry-leading offerings including Adobe Acrobat Studio, Adobe Express, Adobe Firefly, Creative Cloud, Adobe Experience Platform, Adobe Experience Manager, and GenStudio enable people and businesses to turn ideas into impact, powered by AI and driven by human ingenuity.

Our 30,000+ employees worldwide are creating the future and raising the bar as we drive the next decade of growth. We’re on a mission to hire the very best and believe in creating a company culture where all employees are empowered to make an impact. At Adobe, we believe that great ideas can come from anywhere in the organization. The next big idea could be yours.

Let’s Adobe together

At Adobe, we believe in creating a company culture where all employees are empowered to make an impact. Learn more about Adobe life, including our values and culture, focus on people, purpose and community, Adobe for All, comprehensive benefits programs, the stories we tell, the customers we serve, and how you can help us advance our mission of empowering everyone to create.

Adobe is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. We do not discriminate based on gender, race or color, ethnicity or national origin, age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic. Learn more.

Adobe aims to make our Careers website and recruiting process accessible to any and all users. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation to navigate our website or complete the application process, email [e-mail] or call [phone].

AI Use Guidelines for Interviews:

Our interviews are designed to reflect your own skills and thinking. The use of AI or recording tools during live interviews is not permitted unless explicitly invited by the interviewer or approved in advance as part of a reasonable accommodation. If these tools are used inappropriately or in a way that misrepresents your work, your application may not move forward in the process.

At Adobe, we empower employees to innovate with AI — and we look for candidates eager to do the same. As part of the hiring experience, we provide clear guidance on where AI is encouraged during the process and where it’s restricted during live interviews. See how we think about AI in the hiring experience.

Expected Pay Range:

Our compensation reflects the cost of labor across several U.S. geographic markets, and we pay differently based on those defined markets. The U.S. pay range for this positionis $190,200 – $360,500 annually. Paywithin this range varies by work locationand may also depend on job-related knowledge, skills,and experience. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the job location during the hiring process.

In California, the pay range for this position is $248,900 - $360,500

At Adobe, for sales roles starting salaries are expressed as total target compensation (TTC = base + commission), and short-term incentives are in the form of sales commission plans. Non-sales roles starting salaries are expressed as base salary and short-term incentives are in the form of the Annual Incentive Plan (AIP).

In addition, certain roles may be eligible for long-term incentives in the form of a new hire equity award.

State-Specific Notices:

California:

Fair Chance Ordinances

Adobe will consider qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records for employment in accordance with state and local laws and fair chance ordinances.

Colorado:

Application Window Notice

If this role is open to hiring in Colorado (as listed on the job posting), the application window will remain open until at least the date and time stated above in Pacific Time, in compliance with Colorado pay transparency regulations. If this role does not have Colorado listed as a hiring location, no specific application window applies, and the posting may close at any time based on hiring needs.

Massachusetts:

Massachusetts Legal Notice

It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.