Senior AI Engineer: GenAI, RAG & Production Systems

Exponent Inc.; Houston (TX); On-site; USD 160,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Exponent Inc. is seeking a Senior AI Engineer in Houston, TX to design, build, and scale AI solutions for diverse clients.

You will work with multidisciplinary teams to translate complex safety-critical problems into production-grade AI apps, including generative and agentic systems, with strong emphasis on governance and responsible AI practices. The role requires 5+ years of production ML/AI experience, PhD preferred, and deep skills in Python, cloud platforms, and modern AI tooling.

Qualifications

• Ph.D. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Data Science, Electrical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or a related field
• 5+ years of hands-on experience building and deploying machine learning and AI systems in production environments after the completion of the Ph.D.
• Demonstrated experience with generative AI, including LLM application development, prompt engineering, fine-tuning, and RAG architectures
• Experience with agentic frameworks and orchestration tools (e.g., LangChain, LangGraph, LlamaIndex, or comparable)
• Strong software engineering fundamentals in Python; experience with APIs, microservices, and containerization (Docker, ECS/Kubernetes)
• Hands-on experience with cloud platforms (AWS strongly preferred; Azure or GCP acceptable), including serverless and managed AI/ML services
• Familiarity with vector databases (e.g., pgvector, Pinecone, OpenSearch) and knowledge graph technologies is a plus
• Highly proficient in SQL, with the ability to work across large, complex enterprise datasets
• Experience working in consulting or client-facing roles, with the ability to manage ambiguity and deliver under tight timelines
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Presently legally authorized to work in the United States; no immigration sponsorship or processing required

Responsibilities

• Architecting, developing, and deploying end-to-end AI solutions for clients, from data foundations through model development to production deployment
• Building generative AI applications, including retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems, LLM-powered assistants, and domain-specific copilots grounded in enterprise knowledge
• Designing and implementing agentic AI architectures — multi-agent workflows, tool use, orchestration frameworks, and human-in-the-loop controls — for complex analytical and operational tasks
• Developing knowledge representation layers (knowledge graphs, ontologies, semantic search) that ground AI systems in trusted, domain-specific context
• Deploying and scaling AI workloads on cloud infrastructure (AWS preferred), including containerized services, vector databases, and MLOps/LLMOps pipelines
• Rapidly prototyping and iterating on models, analyses, and visualizations in fast-paced, client-facing engagements
• Implementing responsible AI practices, including evaluation frameworks, guardrails, observability, and alignment with client governance and regulatory requirements
• Collaborating with Exponent consultants across engineering and scientific disciplines to embed domain expertise into AI solutions
• Communicating technical approaches and results clearly to both technical and executive client stakeholders
• Mentoring junior team members and contributing to the growth of Exponent's AI capabilities and reusable assets

Skills

Python

APIs

Microservices

Cloud computing

Communication skills

Consulting/client-facing

SQL

Education

Ph.D. in CS/ML/Data Science/EE/Applied Mathematics

Tools

LangChain

LangGraph

LlamaIndex

Docker

Kubernetes

pgvector

OpenSearch

Job description

Exponent Inc. is seeking a Senior AI Engineer in Houston, TX to design, build, and scale AI solutions for diverse clients.

You will work with multidisciplinary teams to translate complex safety-critical problems into production-grade AI apps, including generative and agentic systems, with strong emphasis on governance and responsible AI practices. The role requires 5+ years of production ML/AI experience, PhD preferred, and deep skills in Python, cloud platforms, and modern AI tooling.