Principal Machine Learning Engineer (contract)
Department: Engineering
Employment Type: Contract
Location: Bristol, UK
Reporting To: Ben Derrick
Description
We're building the next UK-headquartered engineering powerhouse. There is a gulf between the needs of mission-focused organisations and the development and delivery of the critical technology they rely on. The consequences of this are felt acutely by underserved frontline operators, demanding a new breed of engineering enterprise to bridge this divide.
Rowden exists to meet this need. We design and build systems, infrastructure, and applications to deliver mission advantage to those working to protect the security of the UK and its allies. Rowden is setting a new standard in government technology provision: hyper-efficient engineering, better customer relationships, and rapid assimilation of commercial technology.
We are seeking an experienced and visionary Principal Machine Learning Engineer to design and develop a scalable, reliable, and secure Generative AI product line. You will be responsible for architecting a dynamic, modular product that integrates linguistic and productivity modules. This role combines high-level system architecture with hands-on coding and requires close collaboration with clients and cross-functional teams to meet the unique needs of military and emergency services operating in tactical-edge environments. While this role primarily focuses on deploying machine learning at the edge, we also welcome applications from engineers with cloud experience who are keen to optimise for limited computing resources.
At a high level, the product leverages the benefits of open-source large language models to enhance productivity for end-users working in disrupted, internet-denied environments. The product combines various technologies and models to enable real-time transcription and translation at the edge, with post-analysis capabilities. Critically, these are operational deployments rather than research projects, designed for tactical environments. Further details will be shared with candidates who progress beyond the initial stage.
Key areas of responsibility
As a Principal Machine Learning Engineer at Rowden, you will be responsible for:
1. Architectural Design: Lead the design and evolution of a modular product architecture that seamlessly integrates with end-user systems, ensuring scalability, reliability, and security.
2. Hands-On Technical Expertise: Actively engage in developing machine learning solutions across a range of applications and technologies, from early-stage research and rapid prototyping to production deployment. Address challenges at each stage of our process and every layer of our tech stack-from data capture, management, development, and integration to testing, evaluation, verification, and deployment.
3. Stakeholder Engagement: Provide critical, engaging subject matter expertise in key stakeholder activities, including customer meetings, conferences, and events where relevant. Work directly with end-users and department leadership to understand their requirements and translate them into a roadmap.
4. Design Authority: Lead and ensure the quality of design and development activities for trust, privacy, safety, security, compliance, high availability, performance, and resilience.
5. Technical Leadership: Mentor and lead a team of developers, fostering a collaborative and innovative work environment.
6. Continuous Innovation: Stay up-to-date with emerging trends and technologies in AI, ML, and LLMs to ensure our solutions remain cutting-edge and effective.
Key skills, experience and behaviours
We are looking for a person with:
1. Production Systems: Proven ability to design and implement modular architectures that integrate multiple components or modules in production environments.
2. Edge Computing: Experience developing solutions for edge environments, including optimisation for hardware constraints.
Critical Technologies
1. Programming Languages: Expert proficiency in Python.
2. Containerisation & Orchestration: In-depth knowledge of Docker and container orchestration tools, such as Kubernetes.
3. Data Storage & Caching: Experience with Redis, Elasticsearch, and other data storage solutions.
4. ML & LLM Operations: Strong skills in automating deployment, monitoring, and scaling of machine learning models using tools like ClearML, Weights & Biases, or MLflow.
5. LLMs & NLP: Expertise in open-source LLMs and NLP frameworks, such as Hugging Face Transformers.
6. RAG & Fine-Tuning Techniques: Solid understanding of Retrieval-Augmented Generation and fine-tuning methods, including their limitations and the latest advancements.
7. Speech Technologies: Hands-on experience with ASR, speech-to-text, text-to-speech, and neural machine translation technologies. Familiarity with Nvidia RIVA, Whisper, or similar.
8. Security Best Practices: Familiarity with security protocols and compliance standards (e.g., ISO 27001, NIST frameworks) relevant to AI/ML systems in high-security sectors.
9. Soft Skills: Excellent communication and leadership skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with both technical teams and customers.
Highly Desirable Knowledge and Experience
Because of the specific tech stack we use, familiarity with the following would be advantageous:
1. Hardware Knowledge: Understanding of custom hardware and embedded systems for edge computing; experience with the Nvidia Jetson suite is a plus.
2. Cloud Platforms: Experience deploying solutions on cloud platforms, such as AWS, is a plus but not essential.
3. Additional Frameworks: Familiarity with frameworks like PyTorch and TensorFlow.
4. Industry Experience: Background in military, defence, or emergency services sectors is beneficial but not essential.
Working at Rowden
We are committed to building a flexible, inclusive, and enabling company. Our aim is to create a diverse team of talented people with unique skills, experience, and backgrounds, so please apply and come as you are!
We also recognise the importance of flexible working and support this wherever we can. We typically operate a flexible, hybrid-working model, with an average 3 days in the office each week (dependent on the role). We welcome the opportunity to discuss flexibility, part-time working requirements and/or workplace adjustments with all our applicants.
Rowden is a Disability Confident Committed company, and we actively encourage people with disabilities and health conditions to apply for our roles. Please let us know your requirements early on so that we can make sure you have everything you need up front to help make the recruitment process and experience as easy as possible.
Finally, if you feel that you don't meet all the criteria included above but have transferable skills and relevant experience, we'd still love to hear from you!
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