Principal Engineer

Principal Engineer AI Systems & Distributed Platforms

Remote (UK) 90,000 to 120,000 Early-Stage AI Start-Up

We're partnered with an early-stage AI business building large-scale operational AI systems designed to automate highly complex enterprise workflows.

This is not another "AI wrapper" business.

The company is developing a sophisticated AI-native platform focused around autonomous workflows, reasoning systems, orchestration, and large-scale document/case processing within highly regulated environments.

They're already live with enterprise customers and are now entering a major scaling phase as both platform demand and customer onboarding accelerate.

As a result, they're looking to hire a Principal Engineer to help shape the next evolution of the platform from both a systems and architecture perspective.

The Opportunity

This role sits directly alongside the engineering leadership team and will play a critical role in scaling the platform from early traction into enterprise-grade infrastructure.

The environment is heavily product-focused and highly autonomous, with engineers operating very close to both customers and operational workflows.

The business is looking for someone capable of:

• Scaling distributed backend systems
• Designing cloud/platform architecture
• Improving orchestration and workflow systems
• Supporting aggressive platform growth
• Helping evolve engineering standards and technical direction
• Remaining hands-on whilst operating at Principal level

Longer-term, there is a genuine pathway into broader engineering leadership as the company scales.

Tech Environment

Current environment includes:

• TypeScript backend engineering
• Node.js
• React / TypeScript frontend
• AWS infrastructure
• Postgres
• Distributed systems
• Queue/event-driven architectures
• LLM integrations
• AI workflow orchestration
• Claude / OpenAI / Anthropic tooling

The business makes heavy use of AI-assisted engineering workflows internally and operates in a very modern product engineering environment.

What They're Looking For

Strong preference for engineers who have:

• Built distributed systems within start-ups or scale-ups
• Strong backend/platform engineering experience
• Experience scaling products and infrastructure
• Cloud architecture experience (AWS ideally)
• Worked within AI-native, ML-heavy, or LLM-focused environments
• Strong systems design capabilities
• Product-focused engineering mindset
• Comfortable operating autonomously in fast-moving environments

This role is probably best suited to someone who still enjoys solving difficult engineering problems hands-on whilst also influencing technical direction at a wider level.

Package

• 110,000- 120,000+
• Remote-first across the UK
• High ownership/autonomy
• Small, highly capable engineering team
• Fast-moving start-up environment
• Significant technical influence internally

If you enjoy solving genuinely difficult systems and scalability challenges within AI-native environments, this is a very strong opportunity to build something meaningful from an early stage.