Founding Ai Engineering Lead

ABOUT US While the world races to automate the future, we’re focused on preparing the generation that will lead it. At ADIIVA, we believe the most powerful time to shape a child’s mind is early on, when curiosity is boundless and values are just beginning to form. We offer parents a way to nurture critical thinking, resilience and independence from the very start. Founded by Kalika Vajpayee, committed to rethinking early learning, ADIIVA is a lean, high-impact startup working at the intersection of two major technological innovations - LLMs and Robotics. With our first office in Bangalore, we are looking to hire an AI Engineering Lead that will help us build a revolutionary product that transforms how children learn. ABOUT THE ROLE Working closely with the founder, you will define and build the technical foundation of the company from the ground up, influencing every aspect of architecture, tooling and product direction. This role offers unparalleled autonomy, significant equity and the chance to co-create a category-defining AI device for children in a 0→1 environment. This is a full time opportunity based in Bengaluru (on-site). Salary is in the range 25 - 35 LPA. WHAT YOU WILL DO - Design the system architecture, covering cloud services, databases, and DevOps workflows - Design data architectures specifically optimized for AI agent operations and large language model integration - Fine-tune and optimize large language models (LLMs) for running on edge devices - Train LLMs on proprietary multimodal datasets, including voice/text transcripts, behavioral cues and developmental content - Evaluate open-source and proprietary models for performance, safety and scale, across cloud and edge environments - Prototype and iterate on multi-step conversational behaviors, memory and alignment strategies - Implement trustworthy AI practices, including hallucination mitigation, toxicity filtering and age-appropriate guardrails - Design systems with data security/ privacy by design, ensuring compliance with regulations - Build production-grade ML pipelines with MLOps best practices: CI/CD, monitoring, versioning and feedback loops - Collaborate cross-functionally with product, child development experts and design teams - Manage and mentor a team of 2-3 engineers WHAT WE LOOK FOR - Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, or an equivalent discipline - Experience building conversational AI voice agents - Ability to work independently in a fast-paced, ambiguous early-stage environment - Growth mindset, strong communication skills and a collaborative spirit - 5+ years of experience in AI/ML/NLP, with 1+ years focused on LLMs - Proven track record of fine-tuning, training and optimizing LLMs - Deep understanding of transformer architectures, attention mechanisms and generative models - Strong Python skills with experience in PyTorch, Hugging Face, TensorFlow, Weights & Biases - Familiarity with LLM orchestration frameworks ( LangGraph, LangChain, or Haystack) - Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and their AI/ML services - Understanding of privacy-preserving techniques (differential privacy, PII redaction) - Exposure to alignment techniques (RLHF, prompt tuning) and safety filters - Comfort with MLOps tooling, containerization (Docker) and orchestration (Kubernetes, Airflow) - Knowledge of RAG and vector databases (e.G., FAISS, Weaviate) - Familiarity with edge devices and how to optimise software to run on them - Ability to explain complex AI concepts to non-technical stakeholders - Passion for building safe, magical AI experiences for children and families BONUS POINTS FOR - Experience building child-facing applications - Familiarity with speech-to-text, voice synthesis, or multimodal learning - Understanding of regulatory frameworks such as COPPA, GDPR, and responsible AI principles WHY JOIN US - Define the future of child-safe AI from day one - Join at ground zero and influence every aspect of the product and technical stack - Collaborate with a small, passionate, and visionary team - Opportunity for ownership, and long-term impact