Cisco
Lead Machine Learning Engineer , AI Defense (Hybrid)
$198K–$323K
Milpitas, California, US · Hybrid · Full-time · Posted Oct 29, 2026
- Experience
- 10+ years with a Bachelor's, 8+ years with a Master's, or 3+ years with a PHD.
- Education
- Bachelor's in Computer Science, Master's, or PHD.
About the job
Leads hands-on architecture and delivery of scalable AI Defense systems that detect, validate, and stop threats to AI applications and agents.
What you'll do
- Define architecture for high-performance platform services that protect AI applications and agents in real time.
- Lead complex design and implementation work, including LLM inference and model-hosting strategy.
- Partner across Product, Threat Research, and Ops to deliver production features; mentor engineers and communicate technical strategy.
What they ask for
- Bachelor's in Computer Science and 10+ years, Master's and 8+ years, or PHD and 3+ years of software engineering experience.
- Experience architecting and delivering large-scale distributed systems.
- Experience with cloud-native backend development and modern cloud infrastructure.
- Prior technical leadership across teams while remaining hands-on.
Nice to have
- Experience with LLM inference, generative AI systems, or AI/ML infrastructure.
- Background in security products or AI security; experience delivering SaaS and hybrid enterprise deployments.
Pay
$216,300.00 to $280,800.00 USD base salary; $216,300.00 - $322,900.00 USD base salary (New York City Metro Area); $197,500.00 - $287,300.00 USD base salary (Non-Metro New York state & Washington state)
Tools
LLM
AI focus
Secures AI platforms, agents, and foundation models; develops AI threat detection and prevention systems and shapes LLM inference and model hosting.
Model-written summary · the original posting is authoritative