> Markdown version of [/jobs/ext/3189001-forward-deployed-engineer](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/jobs/ext/3189001-forward-deployed-engineer). Every page supports `.md` or `Accept: text/markdown`. Links point to the HTML versions so they work for humans too. Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Forward Deployed Engineer - **Company:** IFS - **Location:** Staines-upon-Thames, UK - **Experience:** Expert - **Contract:** Permanent contract - **Skills:** Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), Artificial Intelligence, Automated Storage and Retrieval Systems, User Authentication, Microsoft Azure, Cloud Computing, Data Systems, Software Debugging, Distributed Systems, Python (Programming Language), Software Engineering, Systems Integration, Data Storage Management, Large Language Models, Multi-Agent Systems, Indexer, AI Platforms, Kubernetes, Low Latency, Enterprise Integration, Machine Learning Operations, Restful APIs, Terraform, Data Pipelines, Serverless Computing, Docker, Key Vault - **Published:** September 15, 2026 - **Apply:** https://www.careerjet.co.uk/jobad/gb89ed5ab7b03d76a4bacb8dd139b313b8 ## About the Role * 5+ years of software engineering experience, with strong hands-on capability building and deploying production systems and the ability to work across an unfamiliar stack when needed. * Languages: Strong Python, with the ability and willingness to work across other languages and existing customer codebases. * Cloud & Kubernetes: Experience building and operating cloud-native services. Azure experience - particularly AKS, Blob Storage, Key Vault, and Azure-hosted AI/model services - is highly relevant. * AI & LLM Integration: Experience integrating LLMs and AI services into production applications, including model APIs, authentication, gateways, reliability, latency, cost, and observability. * Agentic Systems: Experience building agentic applications using tools, APIs, and orchestration frameworks. Hands-on MCP experience is strongly preferred. * Retrieval & RAG: Hands-on experience designing production RAG and retrieval systems, including embeddings, vector databases, indexing, retrieval quality, and evaluation. * APIs & Enterprise Integration: Strong experience with REST APIs, authentication/authorization, external systems, data contracts, and debugging complex integrations. * Deployment & IaC: Docker, Kubernetes, Helm, GitOps/ArgoCD, and Terraform or equivalent infrastructure-as-code tooling. * Data & Storage: Comfortable working with data pipelines and across relational, document, vector, and object stores as required by the solution. * Solid understanding of event-driven and distributed systems architecture, applied pragmatically in delivery contexts rather than academically * Understanding of AI evaluation, observability, monitoring, failure modes, and the trade-offs between quality, latency, reliability, and cost. * Experience building and owning production ML/data systems (not just notebooks or prototypes), * You thrive in ambiguity - you can turn "this business flow feels like it needs AI" into a scoped, shipped system without waiting to be told exactly what to build * You communicate well with non-technical stakeholders without dumbing down the substance * Experience working in or alongside platform or infrastructure teams * Able to work directly with customers and stakeholders, turn ambiguous business problems into technical solutions, rapidly prototype, and then productionize those solutions. ## Description As a Forward Deployed Engineer, R&D AI Services, you embed directly with product development teams to understand real business problems and work out the right way to solve them with AI: reusing and extending an existing AI service, or - when nothing suitable exists - scoping the requirements and working with the engineering team to build one. You are the bridge between a product team's business flow and a working AI capability: you know the AI service catalogue well enough to match the right service to the problem, you help teams build AI-first applications on top of it, and when a gap exists, you make sure the right thing gets built to close it. This is a high-agency role for a hands-on senior engineer who is as comfortable in a stakeholder conversation about a business process as they are building and shipping the data pipeline or model-serving system behind it. What you'll do Embed directly with product teams (your internal customers) to understand their business flows and work out where AI genuinely helps * Lead technical discovery: separate the actual bottleneck in a business process from the symptom the product team came to you with * Know the existing catalogue of AI services well enough to spot where one could be applied or extended to solve a product team's problem, and help them design and build AI-first applications on top of it * Where no existing service fits, gather and document the requirements yourself, then partner with the engineering team responsible for AI services to scope, design, and build the new service - you're hands-on throughout, not just handing off a ticket * Get hands-on with the data pipelines, model training and serving, and MLOps tooling behind both new and existing AI services, plus the integrations that connect them into product workflows * Ship a working first version fast, then harden it: proper monitoring, feedback loops from real usage, and production-grade reliability * Translate product team pain points and business requirements into actionable input for the AI services roadmap * Work directly with product owners, business stakeholders, and engineering leads - going deep into the data and code while communicating trade-offs clearly to non-technical audiences * Be the connective tissue between IFS R&D's AI capability and the product teams consuming it - your field insights shape what gets built next ## Related Videos - [Docker Compose: Rediscovered](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1978-docker-compose-rediscovered) - [Dynamic Entities in .NET: Building Low-Code Systems on Top of Entity Framework Core](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/100218-dynamic-entities-in-net-building-low-code-systems-on-top-of-entity-framework-core) - [Best Practices for Using GitHub Secrets](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1214-best-practices-for-using-github-secrets) - [Shipping Faster with Less: Render on Cloud Hosting, AI Workloads, and the Future of DevOps](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1894-shipping-faster-with-less-render-on-cloud-hosting-ai-workloads-and-the-future-of-devops) - [Develop enterprise-ready applications for Microsoft Teams with Azure resources on modern web technologies](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/187-develop-enterprise-ready-applications-for-microsoft-teams-with-azure-resources-on-modern-web-technologies) - [Optimizing Discovery: PostgreSQL's Role in Transforming GetYourGuide's Search](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1647-optimizing-discovery-postgresql-s-role-in-transforming-getyourguide-s-search) ## Related Articles - [How to Become an AI Engineer](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/331-how-to-become-an-ai-engineer) - [Navigating the AI Shift](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/629-navigating-the-ai-shift) - [How We Built a Worry-Free System That Runs for 10+ Years – And What We’d Do Again](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/751-how-we-built-a-worry-free-system-that-runs-for-10-years-and-what-we-d-do-again) - [ I Gave a Video Editor More Autonomy Than a Trading Bot. 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