VP, AI Platform at Engine

Job description

About Engine Engine is the AI-native platform for intelligent travel. For a decade, Engine has built the proprietary technology and supply behind modern business travel, serving over 40,000 customers and nearly 2 million travelers, along with leading travel and AI companies that build on Engine's infrastructure. One system powers business travel, group travel, human agents, and AI agents. That work has earned Engine recognition as TravelTech's Reservation Platform of the Year (2026), a spot on Inc.'s Power Partners list (2026), and one of Built In's Best Places to Work (2020–2026). We're looking for bold, ambitious people to help redefine how businesses manage and experience travel. Working here, you can expect exponential growth, an ambitious pace, full ownership, and high-caliber colleagues who push you to do the best work of your career. Every hire raises the bar. Come outpace the ordinary and build the future of travel with us. The Opportunity Engine is scaling fast: 1,000+ employees, moving upmarket, and using AI to fuel growth. The proof is already in production: 95.2% of merged production code is AI written, we ship roughly 1,300 pull requests a week (up from 800 a year ago, with fewer engineers), and we have restructured teams from 7 engineers to 5 with a gated path to 3. This is one of the most AI mature engineering organizations anywhere, and it is about to go further. To do that coherently, Engine is standing up an AI native operating model with three coequal foundations: AI Platform builds the technical rails, Applied AI ships workflow redesign embedded in every domain, and Workforce Transformation updates the operating system. You lead the first. AI Platform is what everything runs on. Without a single, trusted stack, every team forks its own plumbing and no one can measure or govern what ships. You will not be starting from zero: you inherit a founding team that includes a Principal Architect, a Principal Engineer dedicated to the AI harness, staff level product operations and analytics, and open reqs in flight. As the founding VP, you set the technical strategy, build hands on in the early phase, and scale the org through a Director and principal engineers as adoption proves out. You sit on The Triad with the Senior Director, Applied AI and the Senior Director, Workforce Transformation, prioritizing the enterprise AI roadmap and resolving cross domain calls. What You'll Own AI Platform core. The LLM gateway, agent framework, prompt and agent libraries, and evaluation infrastructure: the rails every Applied AI team and every engineer builds on. Developer experience and the Velocity program. The AI harness, coding agents, testing and autonomy frameworks, and the coverage gates that unlock code merging without human review. This group owns Engine's product delivery cycle time number and is the engine that turns 95.2% AI written code into true autonomy. It is the crown jewel of the role. Product operations, rebuilt as software. We believe product operations becomes an AI native function. This team builds and runs that software: instrumented cadences, automated reporting, gap analysis, and the PD maturity scorecard. It runs the machinery of the PDLC, not the judgment inside it. An AI Product Ops Lead reports into this role. Automation engineering and APIs. Shared APIs, orchestration, and integrations: the rails every automation across Engine uses. AI data infrastructure. The AI consumable layer: retrieval and RAG infrastructure, context pipelines for agents and the knowledge base, evaluation datasets, agent memory, and usage telemetry. This layer consumes Engine's data warehouse through governed interfaces; the warehouse, pipelines, and data quality remain with the Data organization. Observability, security, and cost. Monitoring, cost controls, and the security posture for platform AI, built in by default and in partnership with Security and IT. One stack, enterprise wide. Hold the line on a single shared platform that serves all domains, no forks and no parallel stacks, while meeting the real delivery needs of the Applied AI teams that build on it. Team. Grow the platform org as the roadmap proves out: a Director plus principal and staff engineers across agent platform, infrastructure, evaluation, observability, security, and developer experience. Scope note: Engine's customer facing AI runtime (Prompt Execution Services and the MCP product layer) is owned by a dedicated AI Systems team inside product engineering, with SLAs and on call. AI Platform integrates with it at a defined interface. This role owns the internal platform, not customer traffic. What You Bring Experience. 15+ years in software or platform engineering, including 5+ years leading engineering teams or orgs and 8+ years building platforms or infrastructure other teams depend on. 3+ years hands on with production AI/ML: direct work with LLMs, agents, and evaluation. Given how new production LLM and agent systems are, we weight depth of shipped work over years in the space. Platform and infrastructure leadership at scale. You have built and run shared platforms that many teams depend on, and made the build vs. buy and architecture calls that shaped an engineering org. Deep AI systems expertise. Hands on command of LLMs, agents, orchestration, evaluation, and the production realities of AI: latency, cost, reliability, and safety. Hands on building. You can personally architect and ship core platform services in the founding phase, not just direct others. Executive influence and coequal leadership. You have partnered with executive peers on technical strategy and driven alignment across functions, comfortable owning a lane without absorbing others' mandates. Engineering leadership. Proven ability to hire, level, and grow senior engineering talent and set a high craft bar. Security and responsible AI judgment. You build security, privacy, and safe use controls into AI infrastructure by default. Success in the First Six Months The core rails are live and adopted: LLM gateway, agent framework, and evaluation infrastructure used by the first Applied AI teams and by engineering at large. The Velocity program has a measured baseline: product delivery cycle time instrumented end to end, with the automated weekly scorecard publishing to leadership without manual effort. The path to autonomy is open: coverage gates and testing frameworks live in the first pods, with entry criteria agreed for merging well covered code without human review. The platform is the default way to build AI at Engine, with at least one flagship capability shipped on it and no competing bespoke stacks. Cost controls and a security posture for platform AI are established with Security and IT. The Triad operating rhythm is working, and the platform org (Director plus first principal and staff engineers) is growing on plan. We accept applications for this role on an ongoing basis. We review applications as they are received and encourage interested candidates to apply early. Compensation Our compensation packages are based on several factors, including your experience, expertise, and location. In addition to a competitive base salary, all roles receive equity. Depending on the role, total compensation may also include an annual bonus. Your recruiter will share your complete compensation package as you move through the process. Base Pay Range $336,000 — $400,000 USD The Engine Edge: Perks & Compensation We believe in rewarding great work with great benefits: Compensation: Competitive base pay tied to role and experience, with equity for all employees. Some roles are also eligible for bonuses or commissions. Benefits: Check out our full list at engine.com/culture Environments for Success: Different roles have different needs in terms of the environments that drive success which is why we have a hybrid-hub model. Whether you are in one of our amazing offices or fully remote, we'll make sure you have what you need to succeed. Perks and benefits may vary based on employment type, location, and more

Requirements

Must-haves

Platform and infrastructure leadership at scale. You have built and run shared platforms that many teams depend on, and made the build vs. buy and architecture calls that shaped an engineering org.
Deep AI systems expertise. Hands on command of LLMs, agents, orchestration, evaluation, and the production realities of AI: latency, cost, reliability, and safety.
Hands on building. You can personally architect and ship core platform services in the founding phase, not just direct others.
Executive influence and coequal leadership. You have partnered with executive peers on technical strategy and driven alignment across functions, comfortable owning a lane without absorbing others' mandates.
Engineering leadership. Proven ability to hire, level, and grow senior engineering talent and set a high craft bar.
Security and responsible AI judgment. You build security, privacy, and safe use controls into AI infrastructure by default.
Success in the First Six Months
The core rails are live and adopted: LLM gateway, agent framework, and evaluation infrastructure used by the first Applied AI teams and by engineering at large.
The Velocity program has a measured baseline: product delivery cycle time instrumented end to end, with the automated weekly scorecard publishing to leadership without manual effort.
The path to autonomy is open: coverage gates and testing frameworks live in the first pods, with entry criteria agreed for merging well covered code without human review.
The platform is the default way to build AI at Engine, with at least one flagship capability shipped on it and no competing bespoke stacks.
Cost controls and a security posture for platform AI are established with Security and IT.
The Triad operating rhythm is working, and the platform org (Director plus first principal and staff engineers) is growing on plan.
Compensation: Competitive base pay tied to role and experience, with equity for all employees. Some roles are also eligible for bonuses or commissions.
Benefits: Check out our full list at engine.com/culture
Perks and benefits may vary based on employment type, location, and more

Nice-to-haves

None flagged.

Application prep

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