Senior Solution Architect - Data, Ontology & AI Platforms

Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end architecture of the data, semantic, and AI stack, defining contracts via GraphQL, REST, protobuf, and event streams.
• Lead and mentor a multidisciplinary engineering team, including data, ML, and semantic engineers, through design and PR reviews.
• Architect a modern data platform featuring lakehouse architecture, distributed transformation, and event-driven pipelines.
• Design the semantic/ontology layer, including entity modeling, semantic query APIs, and fine-grained policy enforcement.
• Drive the AI and MLOps layer, overseeing agent orchestration, LLM inference, model registries, and the full experiment-to-serving lifecycle.
• Ensure data and semantic quality through rigorous quality gates, embedding governance, lineage, and auditability by design.
• Act as the technical authority for stakeholders, translating complex AI and data governance requirements into actionable architecture.

Requirements

• 10+ years of experience in software, data, or ML engineering, with at least 5 years in a solution or platform architect role.
• Deep expertise in distributed data systems and lakehouse architectures (e.g., Iceberg, Delta, Hudi) and distributed compute (e.g., Spark).
• Proven experience in semantic/ontology modeling, knowledge modeling, and designing semantic query layers.
• Strong expertise in MLOps and AI-agent systems, including model serving, feature stores, and agent frameworks (e.g., LangGraph).
• Proficiency with vector search, embeddings, and RAG patterns (e.g., Qdrant, pgvector).
• Hands-on coding proficiency in Python, specifically with frameworks like FastAPI and PySpark.
• Strong technical leadership skills with experience writing architecture decision records and mentoring engineers.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience working in highly regulated industries such as financial services, healthcare, or government.
• Familiarity with declarative transformation frameworks like dbt.
• Working knowledge of Kubernetes and observability stacks (e.g., OpenTelemetry, Prometheus, Grafana).
• Experience taking a data or AI platform from initial proof-of-concept to full-scale production.

About the Company

Blackford Technologies LLC is building a modern, intelligent platform where data flows seamlessly from source to intelligent action. We focus on creating a trusted semantic foundation that powers the next generation of AI agents and copilots.