Senior/Lead - Backend Engineer/Data Engineer - AI Engineering

Join FICO's Applied AI team, where scalable backend systems and data pipelines power AI-enabled analytics, decisioning, and automation. As a Senior/Lead Backend Engineer/Data Engineer, you will design, build, and maintain the platform's backend infrastructure, mentor engineers, and ensure reliability and high data quality across AI initiatives. This is a remote role.

Responsibilities

• Design and deploy scalable backend systems and data pipelines that seamlessly integrate applied AI capabilities into FICO's analytics and decision management platform.
• Build high-quality solutions for data ingestion, transformation, and storage, ensuring reliable, high-throughput data flow for real-time analytics.
• Design and implement LLM-powered solutions for decision automation, fraud investigation, and process automation within FICO's platform.
• Develop sophisticated prompting strategies and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) architectures tailored to high-stakes, mission-critical applications.
• Partner with data scientists, ML engineers, and product teams to develop microservices and APIs that enable intelligent, data-driven decision-making.
• Optimize distributed architectures and implement real-time processing frameworks to support high-volume, low-latency workloads.
• Implement advanced monitoring, testing, and performance optimization techniques to ensure system reliability, security, and scalability.
• Define and evolve architectural patterns that support FICO's analytics and decisioning solutions at scale.
• Lead and mentor engineering team members, promoting best practices in software development, data engineering, AI integration, and systems design.

Requirements

• 7+ years of experience in backend or data engineering, with a demonstrated track record of delivering complex, large-scale production systems.
• Strong coding skills in Python, Go, Java, or equivalent languages, with a commitment to clean, maintainable, and well-tested code.
• Hands-on experience with big data frameworks (e.g., Apache Spark, Kafka, Hadoop) and a strong understanding of both relational and NoSQL databases.
• Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and container orchestration tools such as Docker and Kubernetes.
• Proven ability to design, build, and maintain scalable, production-grade backend systems with a focus on reliability and performance.
• Solid experience with testing frameworks (including A/B testing), performance optimization, and production monitoring/observability practices.
• Demonstrated experience integrating AI/ML solutions into production systems, including working with Large Language Models (LLMs) and related techniques.
• Experience with Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) architectures and familiarity with vector databases (e.g., Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector) is strongly preferred.
• Strong problem-solving and communication skills, with the ability to mentor engineers, influence technical direction, and collaborate effectively across disciplines.
• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field. An advanced degree is a plus but not required.

Technologies

• Python
• Go
• Java
• Apache Spark
• Kafka
• Hadoop
• AWS
• GCP
• Azure
• Docker
• Kubernetes
• Large Language Models (LLMs)
• Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)
• Pinecone
• Weaviate
• pgvector

Benefits

• An inclusive culture strongly reflecting core values: Act Like an Owner, Delight Our Customers and Earn the Respect of Others.
• Opportunity to make an impact and grow professionally by leveraging your strengths and engaging in valuable learning experiences.
• Highly competitive compensation, benefits and rewards programs that recognize top performance.
• Engaging, people-first work environment with work-life balance, employee resource groups, and social events.
• Target base pay range for this role is $140,000 to $220,000, reflecting candidate knowledge, skills and experience.

Why make a move to FICO?

• Credit Scoring — FICO Scores are used by 90 of the top 100 US lenders.
• Fraud Detection and Security — FICO fraud systems protect 4 billion payment cards globally.
• Lending — 3/4 of US mortgages are approved using the FICO Score.