AI Engineer

Kraken is looking for an AI Engineer to help us design, develop and deploy secure AI capabilities across our business.

You’ll identify opportunities for AI to make a practical difference, developing applications, automations and knowledge solutions that improve productivity, decision-making, access to information and operational efficiency. You’ll also help integrate approved AI platforms and ensure that solutions remain secure, traceable, reliable and supportable throughout their lifecycle.

Working closely with Engineering, Production, IT & Security and teams across the wider business, you’ll combine hands-on AI engineering with systems integration, security and governance. You’ll also provide secondary support for relevant business systems where this helps enable AI adoption, integration or operational improvement.

• Design, prototype and support secure AI applications, assistants, agents, knowledge systems and workflow automations using approved Microsoft, cloud-hosted and local platforms
• Develop retrieval-augmented generation, semantic search and knowledge-management solutions that connect AI safely to approved systems, documents, databases and APIs
• Design, deploy and govern Model Context Protocol servers, clients and tools that securely connect AI applications to approved business systems and data
• Build appropriate safeguards around AI tools, including authentication, least-privilege permissions, input validation, audit logging and human approval for sensitive actions
• Evaluate AI models, platforms, suppliers and use cases for accuracy, security, privacy, data residency, performance, cost and ongoing supportability
• Help define and maintain AI governance, risk assessments and technical standards
• Apply secure-by-design controls, including data classification, encryption, secrets management, role-based access and separation of development, test and production environments
• Protect against AI-related risks such as data leakage, prompt injection, malicious content, insecure outputs, unsafe tool use and excessive agent permissions
• Monitor AI services for unusual activity, failures and unexpected behaviour
• Ensure AI-generated code, data and outputs are appropriately reviewed and validated
• Support vulnerability remediation and incident investigation and provide practical guidance on responsible AI use
• Support, administer and improve business systems used across Engineering, Manufacturing and corporate functions
• Troubleshoot integration, deployment, data and authentication issues and coordinate upgrades and technical changes with colleagues, suppliers and implementation partners
• Deploy, configure and manage secure AI applications and supporting services across Linux systems, containers and virtual machines, including monitoring, patching, backup and recovery.

• Practical experience designing, developing, deploying or supporting AI-enabled applications, integrations and workflow automations
• Working knowledge of large language models, retrieval-augmented generation, semantic search, AI agents and Model Context Protocol
• Experience deploying and operating applications across Linux systems, containers and virtual machines
• Experience of monitoring, patching, backup and recovery within application environments
• Experience working with APIs, structured data, system integrations, authentication and role-based access control
• Familiarity with source control and automation or scripting
• An understanding of secure development, AI governance, information security, data protection, auditability and responsible AI principles
• Strong analytical and troubleshooting skills
• Clear communication and documentation skills, with the ability to translate business requirements into secure, practical and supportable technical solutions.

You’ll work collaboratively with colleagues across Kraken, including Engineering, Production, Manufacturing, IT & Security and our corporate functions. You’ll communicate clearly, listen to different perspectives and help teams turn business requirements into practical technical solutions.

You’ll take ownership of your work, manage priorities effectively and follow issues through to resolution. Attention to detail, sound judgement and respect for confidentiality will be important, particularly when working with sensitive company and customer information.

This is an opportunity to help shape how AI is adopted across a growing maritime technology and defence business.

You won’t be limited to a single platform or narrowly defined AI project. You’ll work across a broad range of opportunities, from intelligent knowledge access and workflow automation to AI agents, secure systems integration and responsible AI governance.

Your work will directly support teams across Kraken to access information more effectively, make better-informed decisions and improve operational efficiency. You’ll also have the opportunity to influence the technical standards and safeguards that underpin Kraken’s long-term adoption of AI.

• 25 days holiday per year, plus paid bank holiday
• After two years’ consecutive service, one additional day’s annual leave up to a maximum of five additional days annual leave
• Holiday buy/sell, up to five days per calendar year
• Flexi working, core hours 10:00 to 15:00, subject to departmental requirements
• Private Medical Insurance with optional family cover
• Pension scheme with a 5% employer contribution, there is no cap on the employee contribution level
• Life assurance 3x salary
• Group Income Protection
• Health Care Cash Plan
• Cycle to Work Scheme
• Electric Car Scheme
• Employee Assistance Program (EAP) providing mental health and wellbeing support
• Professional membership reimbursement

Due to the nature of our work many of our roles require a UK nationality and the ability to obtain a security clearance.  Applicants who accept a conditional offer of employment must meet the requirement of right to work in the UK and must meet eligibility requirements for access to classified information and will be subject to Government security checks.

Kraken Works Limited is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer.  We are committed to maintaining a workplace that is free from unlawful discrimination and offers equal opportunities to all.  Applications from individuals are encouraged regardless of age, disability, sex, gender reassignment, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, and marriage and civil partnerships.