Artificial Intelligence Engineer

AI Engineer Location: Co Westmeath, mostly on-site Type: Permanent Reports to: Engineering Lead About the Role My client, based in Co Westmeath, is a growing international business. They’re hiring a permanent AI Engineer to design, build and run AI-powered applications, intelligent agents and data-driven solutions that automate work and support better decision-making. This is a hands-on role blending software engineering, data engineering and applied AI. You’ll build scalable, secure, production-ready solutions using LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) and modern AI frameworks, and you’ll turn the company’s proprietary data into reliable, automated insight and action. Key Responsibilities - Design, build and maintain AI agents and agentic workflows that automate data processing, analysis, reporting and wider business processes. - Build LLM-powered applications, integrating external models and services while optimising prompts, context management, performance and cost. - Develop RAG solutions, vector databases and AI-driven data pipelines that combine structured and unstructured data. - Build integrations using Model Context Protocol (MCP) and APIs to securely connect AI systems to internal databases, applications and third-party services. - Own AI features from prototype to production, including testing, monitoring, observability, safe rollback and evaluation of accuracy, latency, reliability and cost. - Apply MLOps/LLMOps best practice, including version control, CI/CD, containerisation and automated deployment. - Put guardrails, access controls and audit trails around agents working with sensitive data, in line with security, privacy and responsible AI standards. - Work with data engineers, data scientists and business stakeholders to turn business problems into practical AI solutions, and keep clear technical documentation. Skills & Experience - Degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Software Engineering or a related discipline. - 3+ years in software engineering, data engineering or AI/ML development, with a track record of delivering production solutions. - Strong Python, with hands-on experience integrating LLM APIs (OpenAI, Azure OpenAI, Anthropic Claude or similar) and AI frameworks such as LangChain, LlamaIndex or equivalent. - Working knowledge of MCP, RAG, vector databases, embeddings and system-level prompt engineering. - Experience with Azure AI or other cloud AI platforms, plus MLOps/LLMOps practices, Docker and CI/CD. - Solid grasp of AI security, governance, privacy and responsible AI. Experience in a regulated industry is desirable. - Ability to translate business requirements into practical AI solutions. The Person - A self-directed technical expert who can work on their own initiative and deliver best-practice AI that supports the team’s goals. - Curious and pragmatic, keeping pace with a fast-moving AI landscape and recommending new tools only where they add real business value. - A strong relationship builder who communicates clearly with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.