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Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Principal Machine Learning Engineer - **Company:** Cisco Systems, Inc. - **Location:** Milpitas, CA, United States - **Experience:** Experienced - **Salary:** $296,300.0 - **Contract:** Permanent contract - **Skills:** LangGraph Framework, Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), Artificial Intelligence, Computing Platforms, Software as a Service, Cloud Computing, Code Generation, Computer Engineering, System Configuration, Distributed Systems, Python (Programming Language), Machine Learning, Node.Js, Systems Development Life Cycle, Microsoft Copilot, Software Engineering, Data Streaming, TypeScript, Cloud Platform System, ReactJS, Large Language Models, Multi-Agent Systems, Generative AI, Backend, Agentic-AI, Containerization, AI Platforms, Kubernetes, Information Technology, Machine Learning Operations, Front End Software Development, Evaluation of Large Language Models, Api Management, Cisco, Docker, Microservices - **Published:** October 19, 2026 - **Apply:** https://dejobs.org/x/x/6EECBCE82FF648788FCA595DD9B8E825/job/ ## About the Role * An AI-first mindset paired with the ability to exercise sound technical judgment and decompose vague, complex problems into well-scoped, actionable deliverables. * Experience building shared infrastructure, abstractions, and "paved roads" that enhance productivity across engineering teams. * Proficiency in spec-driven and schema-driven development, including the use of code generation, strongly typed API contracts, and implementation traceability. * Understanding of the unique architecture and operational constraints associated with both SaaS and on-premise deployment models. * Ability to mentor immediate team members while effectively driving technical decision-making across cross-functional and cross-organizational boundaries. * Experience building LLM / agentic systems: orchestrators, ReAct-style and deep agents, tool calling, MCP servers, streaming and asynchronous task results, and disambiguation in conversation. * Experience running services on Kubernetes, including deployment configuration, secret management, and health checks, and working closely with SRE. * Strong debugging skills across service boundaries using logs, traces, and metrics. * Clear technical writing and the ability to lead design reviews with engineers, QA, product, and security., * Education & Experience: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related technical field with 12+ years of software engineering experience; OR Master's degree with 10+ years; OR PhD with 7+ years; OR an equivalent combination of education and verified industry experience. * Platform & Cloud Systems Experience: Minimum of 8 years of experience designing and deploying distributed cloud software platforms, microservices, or enterprise-scale automation systems. * Technical Leadership Track Record: Minimum of 4 years serving in a technical leadership capacity (e.g., Principal Engineer, Lead Architect, or Technical Lead) driving architectural decisions across multi-disciplinary engineering teams. * AI Software Development Lifecycle (AI-SDLC): Experience leveraging code gen tools for software development leading to significant productivity improvements. * AI Applications : Demonstrated experience building and deploying production applications utilizing Generative AI, LLM orchestration frameworks, or AI assistants/copilots. * Core Engineering Proficiency: Hands-on experience developing backend or full-stack software using modern languages (e.g., Python, Go, or TypeScript/Node.js) and cloud-native technologies (e.g., Kubernetes, Docker, cloud hyperscaler platforms)., * Experience architecting multi-agent systems, agentic workflow runtimes, or graph-based execution engines (e.g., LangGraph, MCP). * Experience with harness engineering, and loop engineering. * Experience developing enterprise developer platforms, SDKs, APIs, and modern front-end user interfaces (e.g., React, TypeScript). * Experience with model serving infrastructure, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) architectures, and LLM evaluation/benchmarking frameworks. * Authored technical patents, peer-reviewed publications, or significant open-source contributions in distributed systems, software platforms, or applied AI. ## Description The AI Software & Platform Team designs and builds enterprise AI platform software to enhance security resilience, threat defense, and operational automation across Cisco's portfolio. The team consists of front-end, backend, and machine learning engineers developing core platform infrastructure, agentic frameworks, and AI-enabled product interfaces. The AI Software & Platform Team designs and operates the core platform infrastructure connecting Cisco's enterprise product dashboards with intelligent, agentic AI capabilities. The team consists of front-end, backend, machine learning engineers and applied AI researchers developing core platform infrastructure, agentic frameworks, and AI-enabled product interfaces., As a Principal Software Engineer, you will serve as a lead technical architect and technical authority for the AI Platform Engineering team. In this role, you will define the architectural vision, lead system design, and direct technical execution for the Agentic Ops Solution (AI Canvas) and associated AI platform capabilities. You will drive technical standards, evaluate emerging technologies, and collaborate with product management and engineering teams to deliver scalable AI systems.