Senior AI Engineer

Overview

We are a development , data science and design studio that works closely with founders and executives to create custom software and machine learning solutions. AE Studio builds products, platforms, and internal ventures that increase agency for all conscious beings. We combine world-class software engineering, AI expertise, and product design to ship ambitious projects that matter. We’re looking for a Senior AI Engineer who can bridge the gap between AI experimentation and production-quality engineering, someone who can design, build, and ship robust AI-powered systems while maintaining the standards of a top-tier software developer. If you’ve got a portfolio full of shipped production grade products, know your way around LLM APIs and embeddings, and can architect scalable pipelines with proper testing and monitoring, you’ll feel right at home here.

• Design & build AI-powered applications from scratch, from prototype to production.
• Create AI pipelines (data ingestion, preprocessing, embeddings, retrieval, orchestration) that are scalable and maintainable.
• Engineer prompting strategies for real-world performance, not just demo hype.
• Integrate AI models into full-stack applications with robust APIs (if you never made an API call for OpenAI or Anthropic, don\'t even try), frontend integration, and CI/CD pipelines.
• Collaborate with designers, PMs, and other engineers to deliver end-to-end product experiences.
• Continuously evaluate new AI tools & models for performance, cost, and alignment with project goals.
• Write production-grade, testable, maintainable code in languages like Python, TypeScript, and others relevant to the stack.

• 7+ years of professional software engineering experience.
• Proven experience building and shipping AI-powered applications (bonus if you can link to live products).
• You can code in any language supported by AI tools.
• Deep understanding of LLM architectures, embeddings, vector databases, and orchestration frameworks.
• Solid grasp of software architecture, scalability, and performance optimization.
• A bias toward shipping, with the discipline to follow best practices (testing, code reviews, monitoring).
• Ability to self-manage, communicate clearly, and thrive in a collaborative remote environment.

• Experience fine-tuning models or training custom models on domain-specific data.
• Contributions to open-source AI tools or libraries.
• Strong understanding of prompt engineering beyond “trial and error”, including evaluation frameworks.
• Background in data engineering or MLOps.
• Passion for AI alignment, agency-increasing technologies, and ethical AI development.

• High-impact projects, everything we do is built to last and built to matter.
• A team of founder-minded engineers, designers, and thinkers.
• Freedom to experiment rapidly while holding a high bar for quality.
• Global, remote-first culture.
• Competitive salary + performance-based bonuses.

Send us:

• Your resume or LinkedIn
• Links to AI projects you’ve shipped (live apps, GitHub repos, case studies — not just demos)
• A short note on the most challenging AI problem you’ve solved and how you solved it

If you can write prompts that work today and code that still works in two years, we want to talk to you.

Salary range from $115k/year to $185k/year. Not in the range? That\'s fine, you can still apply and our team may fit you in a more senior position that we’re not actively hiring right now, but we are growing fast and may have other openings soon. This range considers people based in California.

Working at AE means receiving equity in our client projects and in Skunkworks ventures. The equity is priced at $0 when granted for tax reasons, but AE invests millions into these projects. Equity comes from reduced margins on client work and internal funding. You get a real stake in the things you help build.

The longer you stay, the more value you create and the more equity you receive. If you leave on good terms, you can retain 20% of your equity by staying engaged. If you spin out a Skunkworks venture, you retain 100%.