Principal Engineer, Agent Platform

Gap Inc; Coppell (TX); On-site; USD 210,000 - 273,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Merchandise discount

Paid Time Off (PTO)

Volunteer hours

401(k) plan

Employee stock purchase plan

Medical, dental, vision coverage

Job summary

Gap Inc. is building an enterprise AI agent platform used across the company to create, deploy, govern, and operate AI-powered solutions at scale.

As a Principal Engineer, you will shape the technical foundation for agent development, building services, frameworks, and guardrails for secure, reliable, observable platforms. This hands-on role spans architecture, software design, and platform development across AI, distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, security, and governance to help teams

Qualifications

• Extensive experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems in production.
• Strong software engineering background with expert-level Python development skills.
• Hands-on experience delivering production LLM, generative AI, or agent-based solutions.
• Deep understanding of agent architectures, orchestration patterns, and enterprise AI platforms.
• Experienced with retrieval systems, embeddings, vector search, and context management strategies.

Responsibilities

• Design and build core platform services that enable enterprise AI agent development and operations.
• Define the architecture, engineering patterns, and technical standards for the AI agent platform.
• Develop and maintain a centralized model gateway for routing, governance, resiliency, and cost management.
• Build agent runtime capabilities that support long-running workflows, orchestration, and human-in-the-loop processes.
• Design secure identity, authorization, and policy enforcement mechanisms for agents and tools.
• Establish platform capabilities for context management, memory, retrieval, and data isolation.
• Create testing, evaluation, and release frameworks that ensure agent quality, safety, and performance.
• Implement observability, auditability, and operational tooling for monitoring and troubleshooting agent behavior.
• Partner with Security, Data Governance, and Cloud Infrastructure teams to define platform controls and guardrails.
• Mentor engineers, influence technical direction, and raise engineering standards across multiple teams.

Skills

Distributed systems

Python

LLM / AI agents

Agent architectures

Context management

Security & governance

Observability

Cloud platforms

Leadership by expertise

Tools

Python tooling

GCP services

Vertex AI / Gemini

Job description

About Gap Inc.

At Gap Inc., we create culture as much as we create clothes. Our ambition is to become a high-performing house of iconic American brands that shape culture.

About Gap Inc.

At Gap Inc., we create culture as much as we create clothes. Our ambition is to become a high-performing house of iconic American brands that shape culture.
Our portfolio—Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic, and Athleta—each brings a distinct point of view to how we show up in the world and serve our customers.
Old Navy democratizes style with quality and value for all. Gap champions originality through essential pieces that celebrate individuality. Banana Republic is rooted in a spirit of discovery, creating modern pieces inspired by craftsmanship and travel. Athleta champions the Power of She through confidence, strength, and movement.
We’re driven by a shared purpose: to bridge gaps—between people, perspectives, and possibilities—to create a better world.
We’re building a team that performs at a high level—people who think boldly, take ownership, and turn ideas into impact. If you’re ready to learn fast and help shape what’s next, you’ll fit right in.

About The Role

We are building the enterprise AI agent platform that teams across the company will use to create, deploy, govern, and operate AI-powered solutions at scale. As a Principal Engineer, you will help define the technical foundation for agent development across the organization, building the services, frameworks, and guardrails that make AI agents secure, reliable, observable, and easy to adopt. This is a hands‑on engineering role focused on architecture, software design, and platform development. You will work across AI, distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, security, and governance to deliver a platform that enables product and engineering teams to move quickly while meeting enterprise standards for security, compliance, and operational excellence.

What you'll do

• Design and build core platform services that enable enterprise AI agent development and operations
• Define the architecture, engineering patterns, and technical standards for the AI agent platform
• Develop and maintain a centralized model gateway for routing, governance, resiliency, and cost management
• Build agent runtime capabilities that support long-running workflows, orchestration, and human‑in‑the‑loop processes
• Design secure identity, authorization, and policy enforcement mechanisms for agents and tools
• Establish platform capabilities for context management, memory, retrieval, and data isolation
• Create testing, evaluation, and release frameworks that ensure agent quality, safety, and performance
• Implement observability, auditability, and operational tooling for monitoring and troubleshooting agent behavior
• Partner with Security, Data Governance, and Cloud Infrastructure teams to define platform controls and guardrails
• Mentor engineers, influence technical direction, and raise engineering standards across multiple teams

Who you are

• Extensive experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems in production
• Strong software engineering background with expert‑level Python development skills
• Hands‑on experience delivering production LLM, generative AI, or agent‑based solutions
• Deep understanding of agent architectures, orchestration patterns, and enterprise AI platforms
• Experienced with retrieval systems, embeddings, vector search, and context management strategies
• Knowledgeable in AI evaluation, testing methodologies, and quality assurance for non‑deterministic systems
• Proficient with Google Cloud services including Vertex AI, Gemini, GKE, Cloud Run, BigQuery, and Pub/Sub
• Experienced with cloud security, workload identity, OAuth, policy-as-code, and secure‑by‑design architectures
• Strong understanding of distributed system reliability patterns, including resiliency, retries, observability, and fault tolerance
• Proven ability to influence technical direction, drive adoption of architectural standards, and lead through expertise rather than authority

Salary Range: $209,700.00 - $272,600.00
Employee pay will vary based on factors such as qualifications, experience, skill level, competencies and work location. We will meet minimum wage or minimum of the pay range (whichever is higher) based on city, county and state requirements.

Benefits at Gap Inc.

• Merchandise discount for our brands: 50% off regular-priced merchandise at Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic and Athleta, and 30% off at Outlet for all employees.
• One of the most competitive Paid Time Off plans in the industry.*
• Employees can take up to five “on the clock” hours each month to volunteer at a charity of their choice.*
• Extensive 401(k) plan with company matching for contributions up to four percent of an employee’s base pay.*
• Employee stock purchase plan.*
• Medical, dental, vision and life insurance.*
• See more of the benefits we offer.
• For eligible employees

Gap Inc. is an equal‑opportunity employer and is committed to providing a workplace free from harassment and discrimination. We are committed to recruiting, hiring, training and promoting qualified people of all backgrounds, and make all employment decisions without regard to any protected status. We have received numerous awards for our long‑held commitment to equality and will continue to foster a diverse and inclusive environment of belonging. In 2022, we were recognized by Forbes as one of the World's Best Employers and one of the Best Employers for Diversity.