Staff AI Engineer Software

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: No relocation assistance available
CLEARANCE REQUIRED FOR START: No
CLEARANCE TYPE: Secret
TRAVEL: Yes, 10% of the TimeDescription
At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.
Description
At Northrop Grumman, we have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way.
Northrop Grumman is seeking a Staff AI Software Engineer to support the development, integration, and deployment of advanced AI-enabled software solutions to support our Systems Engineering Integration & Test (SEIT) department. As a member of the SEIT department you’ll work in a fast-paced team environment alongside physicists, design engineers, and superconducting foundry engineers to make our technologies a reality. This position will serve on-site at Spectrum Center, San Diego.
Responsibilities:
Lead the design, development, integration, and sustainment of advanced AI-enabled software products and supporting systems across cloud and local/on-premises environments.
Initiate advanced development efforts and help shape technical direction from concept through deployment, transition, and sustainment.
Evaluate AI/ML use cases based on mission need, data availability, model suitability, hardware constraints, latency, scalability, security, and operational risk.
Guide teams through implementation of complex AI and software solutions across software, systems, cyber, networking, DevOps, and operations domains.
Translate customer, mission, and business objectives into secure, scalable, and maintainable technical solutions that account for cost, schedule, and performance constraints.
Lead technical trade studies, architecture assessments, and solution analyses to support complex engineering and product decisions.
Develop and refine AI systems using appropriate model adaptation, fine-tuning, evaluation, and deployment approaches for operational use.
Design AI/software solutions that effectively leverage available compute resources, including GPU, memory, storage, networking, and deployment limitations.
Secure and harden end-to-end systems, including infrastructure, platforms, applications, data flows, models, and development pipelines.
Evaluate and securely leverage open-source frameworks, models, and tools while maintaining sound engineering, security, and supportability practices.
Identify high-value technical improvement opportunities and independently drive solutions that improve performance, resiliency, efficiency, security, or cost.
Present technical strategies, risks, and recommendations to program leadership, directors, customers, and other stakeholders.
Support proposal activities, technical planning, budgeting, scheduling, and execution planning for advanced development efforts.
Mentor engineers, strengthen technical networks across teams, and help elevate engineering standards and execution across the organization.
Basic Qualifications for Principal AI Software Engineer:
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Systems Engineering, or related STEM discipline with 12 years of relevant experience; or 10 years with a Master’s degree; or 8 years with a PhD.
Candidate must be a US Citizen.
Proven ability to move AI capabilities from research or prototype stage into reliable operational use.
Integration of AI into larger end-to-end systems.
Experience evaluating AI/ML solutions against data quality, operational constraints, compute availability, and mission suitability.
Experience deploying software or AI systems into complex production, lab, or mission environments.
Experience performing technical trade studies and making architecture decisions across performance, cost, security, and maintainability.
Experience integrating AI capabilities into larger end-to-end systems rather than isolated prototypes.
Experience with modern development practices including version control, test automation, CI/CD, and containerized deployment workflows.
Clearance: A current/active DoD Secret clearance.
Preferred Qualifications for Principal AI Software Engineer:
Experience leading advanced AI/ML development efforts from early concept through deployment and sustainment.
Experience evaluating and deploying AI solutions with consideration for accuracy, latency, throughput, robustness, and hardware efficiency.
Experience with computer vision, robotics, autonomous systems, or swarm/distributed intelligent systems.
Experience with GPU optimization, distributed inference, or deployment in constrained compute environments.
Experience fine-tuning large language models or related foundation models using methods such as LoRA, QLoRA, domain-adaptive pretraining, or similar adaptation approaches.
Working knowledge across adjacent domains such as cyber security, networking, DevOps, systems engineering, or platform engineering.
Experience securing end-to-end AI/software platforms spanning infrastructure, applications, data, models, interfaces, and deployment pipelines.
Experience evaluating and incorporating open-source models, frameworks, and tooling in a secure and supportable manner.
Familiarity with modern software delivery practices including CI/CD, containerization, automation, and platform operations.
Demonstrated ability to influence technical strategy, advise management or customers on advanced technical efforts, and represent the organization on complex initiatives.
Experience supporting proposals, technical planning, estimation, budget discussions, and schedule-driven execution.
Proven ability to mentor others, build technical networks, and drive collaboration across large interdisciplinary teams.
Track record of delivering measurable mission or business value through new capability development, cost savings, force multiplication, or operational efficiency.
Primary Level Salary Range: $214,200.00 - $321,200.00
The above salary range represents a general guideline; however, Northrop Grumman considers a number of factors when determining base salary offers such as the scope and responsibilities of the position and the candidate's experience, education, skills and current market conditions.
Depending on the position, employees may be eligible for overtime, shift differential, and a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Annual bonuses are designed to reward individual contributions as