Sr Software Engineer, AI Development

This is not a maintenance role. This is a reinvention role located in Huntsville AL.

We are looking for a Principal Software Engineer who doesnt just build systemsbut reshapes how they are conceived delivered and trusted. Someone who pairs deep technical credibility with architectural vision and who has the conviction to challenge legacy approaches when the mission demands more.

In this role you will be a technical provocateur and lead engineer driving the design and delivery of AI-enabled agentic and intelligent software platforms that dramatically accelerate modernization and outcomes. Youll operate at the highest altitudesetting technical direction evaluating emerging technologies and prototyping whats nextwhile still diving deep to turn ideas into production-grade reality.

This is a role for builders who bias toward action who believe disruption can coexist with rigor and who want to apply cutting-edge AI to the problems that matter most.

Why This Role Matters

We are here to radically remake software systems that underpin the countrys most critical missionsaviation healthcare energy and other safety-critical domains where failure is not an option. We are bringing agentic AI transformation not to trivial demos or disposable apps but to the hardest highest-stakes systems:

Systems with extreme safety security and resilience requirements
Systems constrained by regulation legacy architecture and operational risk
Systems where speed to outcome must increase without compromising trust
Our ambition is simple and audacious: move faster than ever before while raising the bar on safety and reliability.

Key Responsibilities

Technical Leadership & Architecture

Provide Thought leadership in the future opportunities in AI and agentic-enabled tools capabilities and challenges
Serve as the architectural lead for AI- and agentic-enabled tooling establishing patterns reference implementations and best practices.
Design scalable secure and resilient software systems that integrate LLMs multi-agent workflows code intelligence and automation.
Own and drive the technical roadmap for next-generation software acceleration toolsincluding IDE extensions code-analysis agents refactoring engines and developer-assistive AI.
Lead architecture reviews evaluate new technologies and set engineering standards for AI safety quality reliability and observability.
Hands-On Engineering
Build high-quality software with modern languages and frameworks (e.g. Python TypeScript Go Java).
Develop pipelines and services that enable AI reasoning code analysis static/dynamic analysis and automated transformation of legacy systems.
Prototype early concepts rapidly and transition successful prototypes into robust production systems.
Integrate AI/ML models (commercial open-source or custom) into enterprise environments and developer workflows.
AI & Agentic Systems Development
Design and build agentic orchestration tool-use interfaces embeddings systems context windows and retrieval-augmented workflows.
Implement human-in-the-loop safety and review patterns.
Develop mechanisms for grounding guardrailing and evaluating AI performance and correctness.
Leverage AI to analyze modernize and refactor large complex codebases (e.g. COBOL C).
Collaboration & Influence
Partner with product UX and platform teams to define features user journeys and developer experience goals.
Act as a technical mentor to senior and mid-level engineers; cultivate a culture of excellence and continuous learning.
Collaborate closely with research data and cybersecurity teams to ensure solutions are safe secure and aligned with mission needs.
Represent the engineering team in internal and external forums contributing to thought leadership in AI and software engineering modernization.

Required Qualifications
Bachelors degree and 8 years experience in software engineering including significant experience at the senior/architect level. Additional experience may be considered in lieu of a degree.
Expertise in designing and building distributed systems developer tools or platform engineering products.
Hands-on experience implementing AI/ML systems or integrating large language models into production workflows.
Strong knowledge of agentic frameworks orchestration tools RAG vector databases API design and microservices.
Deep understanding of software design patterns CI/CD DevSecOps and cloud-native architectures (AWS/Azure/GCP).
Strong coding proficiency in at least two modern languages (Python Go Java C# etc.).
Ability to drive technical strategy influence cross-functional teams and communicate complex ideas clearly.
Must be authorized to work in the U.S.
Ability to obtain and maintain a Secret security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications
Experience modernizing legacy systems (e.g. mainframe Java ).
Background building developer experience (DevX) tools IDE integrations or code-intelligence systems.
Experience with AI/ML model fine-tuning prompt engineering or evaluation frameworks.
Familiarity with cybersecurity secure-by-design principles or government/missions systems
Prior role as a thought leader principal engineer architect or technical founder.

If youre looking for comfort keep scrolling. At Leidos we outthink outbuild and outpace the status quo because the mission demands it. Were not hiring followers. Were recruiting the ones who disrupt provoke and refuse to fail. Step 10 is ancient history. Were already at step 30 and moving faster than anyone else dares.

Original Posting:

Pay Range:

The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline onlyand not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job education experience knowledge skills and abilities as well as internal equity alignment with market data applicable bargaining agreement (if any) or other law.