Distinguished AI Engineer

Rapid7•Remote - California, CA

1d•$273,900 - $370,500•Remote

About The Position

Rapid7 is hiring a Distinguished AI Engineer to set the long-term technical vision and multi-year strategy for LLM and agentic AI systems across its security platform and engineering organization. The role shapes architecture, roadmaps, company-wide investment, model strategy, and standards, while ensuring strategy is executed across multiple organizations. The engineer remains close to complex technical challenges and selects appropriate approaches across LLMs, predictive AI, and classical machine learning. Rapid7’s AI Engineering team takes models from research to production, combining open-source and frontier LLMs, AI agents, predictive models, and Rapid7’s security expertise. Its work supports Detection and Response use cases such as alert triage, threat investigation, and automated response, and Exposure and Remediation use cases such as vulnerability prioritization, attack surface risk assessment, and guided remediation. The Distinguished AI Engineer will guide high-impact initiatives, establish engineering, evaluation, and responsible-AI standards, partner with executive leadership, anticipate changes in AI and the threat landscape, and develop senior engineering talent. The role also represents Rapid7 to customers, partners, researchers, and the broader industry. The annual U.S. salary range is $273,900 to $370,500, depending on location; the range excludes variable or incentive compensation, equity, and benefits.

Requirements

At least 16 years of software or machine-learning engineering experience.
At least 2 years leading the design of production LLM or agentic AI systems.
Track record of defining technical strategy and platforms that shaped products or businesses at company scale.
Authoritative expertise in LLMs and AI systems, including transformer architecture, training, post-training, evaluation, and inference optimization at scale.
Technical breadth across predictive AI, classical machine learning, distributed systems, and data platforms, with judgment to choose approaches based on accuracy, latency, cost, and risk.
Experience shaping evaluation strategy, safety, and responsible-AI practices for LLM and agent systems.
Experience scaling AI workloads in production.
Ability to take accountability for long-term technical direction, anticipate strategic risks, resolve consequential challenges, and deliver sustained business and customer value.
Exceptional communication skills and ability to articulate technical vision, influence senior leadership, and shape strategic decisions about AI direction and investment.
Ability to build alignment among senior technical and business stakeholders across organizational boundaries.
Ability to thrive in ambiguity and drive change as AI technology and the threat landscape evolve.
Sustained recognition as an AI industry expert, evidenced by publications, patents, open-source leadership, or influence in industry and standards bodies.
Ability to develop and inspire senior technical talent.
Commitment to embodying Rapid7’s core values.

Nice To Haves

A PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, AI, or a related field; equivalent depth of expertise demonstrated through industry experience and technical contributions is also accepted.
Experience scaling AI workloads in production on AWS.

Responsibilities

Define the AI technology vision, architecture strategy, and multi-year roadmap across Detection and Response, Exposure and Remediation, and the wider platform.
Shape company-wide investment and model strategy, including build, buy, or partner decisions and investments in frontier, open-source, and in-house model capabilities.
Sponsor and guide high-risk, high-impact AI initiatives across multiple organizations, stepping into difficult technical problems to unblock progress.
Establish engineering, evaluation, and responsible-AI standards for how AI systems are built, evaluated, and released at Rapid7.
Partner with executive leadership to align AI strategy with business strategy, product direction, and customer needs.
Anticipate shifts in AI and the threat landscape and drive organizational responses.
Mentor and develop Senior Principal, Principal, and Staff engineers, building AI engineering leadership.
Represent Rapid7 in AI and security with customers, partners, researchers, and the industry.
Take accountability for long-term technical direction and outcomes, anticipating strategic risks and ensuring AI investments deliver sustained business and customer value.
Influence senior technical and business stakeholders and long-term AI priorities and investment across organizational boundaries.
Shape the long-term AI vision around customer needs and commercial opportunity, balancing customer value, competitive advantage, and sustainable economics.
Develop and inspire senior technical talent and the next generation of AI technical leaders.
Embody Rapid7’s core values and foster a culture of excellence, meaningful impact, and collective success.