Director of End-to-End AI Applications - Infinia

Overview

This is an incredible opportunity to be part of a company that has been at the forefront of AI and high-performance data storage innovation for over two decades. DataDirect Networks (DDN) is a global market leader renowned for powering many of the world's most demanding AI data centers, in industries ranging from life sciences and healthcare to financial services, autonomous cars, Government, academia, research and manufacturing.

"DDN's A3I solutions are transforming the landscape of AI infrastructure." – IDC

“The real differentiator is DDN. I never hesitate to recommend DDN. DDN is the de facto name for AI Storage in high performance environments” - Marc Hamilton, VP, Solutions Architecture & Engineering | NVIDIA

DDN is the global leader in AI and multi-cloud data management at scale. Our cutting-edge data intelligence platform is designed to accelerate AI workloads, enabling organizations to extract maximum value from their data. With a proven track record of performance, reliability, and scalability, DDN empowers businesses to tackle the most challenging AI and data-intensive workloads with confidence.

Our success is driven by our unwavering commitment to innovation, customer-centricity, and a team of passionate professionals who bring their expertise and dedication to every project. This is a chance to make a significant impact at a company that is shaping the future of AI and data management.

Our commitment to innovation, customer success, and market leadership makes this an exciting and rewarding role for a driven professional looking to make a lasting impact in the world of AI and data storage.

Job Description

As the Director of End-to-End AI Applications, you will lead the design, development, and delivery of production-grade AI applications that power strategic customer use cases—from data ingestion and pipeline orchestration to inference, visualization, and decision automation.

This role requires a unique blend of deep technical expertise, product vision, and execution leadership across the full AI lifecycle. You will partner closely with Engineering, Product Management, Field Teams, and strategic customers to build scalable, reliable, and intelligent application layers on top of high-performance AI infrastructure.

This is a hands-on technical leadership role — where vision meets execution. You’ll champion the use of AI-native tools, automation frameworks, and platform integrations to reduce time-to-insight, accelerate delivery velocity, and drive tangible business outcomes.

Key Responsibilities

AI Solution Architecture & Delivery

• Define and own the architecture of full-stack AI applications—from data ingestion to model serving and feedback loops.
• Lead cross-functional teams to deliver end-to-end AI solutions across domains such as GenAI, Computer Vision, LLMOps, and Predictive Analytics.
• Build reusable frameworks, automation patterns, and reference architectures to accelerate solution delivery.
• Embed observability, testing, and governance into every layer of the AI pipeline.

Team Leadership & Strategic Alignment

• Build and lead a world-class team of AI architects, ML engineers, full-stack developers, and product owners.
• Define and track OKRs focused on delivery velocity, reliability, customer impact, and AI innovation.
• Drive a culture of experimentation, continuous learning, and automation-first thinking.

Customer Engagement & Business Impact

• Serve as the technical face of AI applications for strategic customers—translating complex problems into actionable, scalable solutions.
• Partner with Engineering and Product teams to align AI investments with business value.
• Participate in executive briefings, solution workshops, and proof-of-value engagements to drive customer success.

AI/ML Tooling & Operational Excellence

• Leverage cutting-edge AI development and deployment tooling—prompt engineering, vector databases, pipeline orchestration (e.g., Kubeflow, Airflow), and LLM fine-tuning platforms.
• Champion AI observability and model performance monitoring for real-time feedback and drift detection.
• Drive automation of MLOps workflows using CI/CD, feature stores, and scalable inference platforms (Triton, Ray, KServe, etc.).

Required Qualifications

• 12+ years’ experience building distributed systems or data-driven applications, with 8+ years in AI/ML application delivery.
• Proven success designing and delivering production-grade AI solutions, including NLP, CV, or recommendation systems.
• Deep expertise in AI/ML lifecycle management, including data ops, model training, serving, and retraining loops.
• Strong knowledge of Python, cloud-native architectures (Kubernetes, serverless), and scalable data pipelines.
• Experience leading high-performing engineering and AI teams across geographies.
• Exceptional communication, executive storytelling, and business alignment skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with GenAI/LLM platforms (e.g., OpenAI, Hugging Face, LangChain, Vector DBs).
• Familiarity with model compression, optimization, and accelerated inference using GPUs or custom silicon.
• Prior leadership in launching AI-enabled SaaS products or customer-facing analytics platforms.
• Contributions to open-source AI tooling or active participation in the AI/ML community.

This position requires participation in an on-call rotation to provide after-hours support as needed.

Success Metrics – First 30 Days

• Technical & Organizational Ramp-Up
• Build deep understanding of existing AI pipeline capabilities and ongoing initiatives.
• Meet with key stakeholders across Product, Engineering, and Field organizations.
• Deliver a gap analysis and strategic roadmap for E2E AI application acceleration.
• Team & Execution Setup
• Identify and fill critical talent or process gaps within the AI application delivery team.
• Establish agile delivery rituals and backlog prioritization aligned with business value.
• Strategic Initiatives Kickoff
• Select and launch 1–2 high-impact pilot projects with clear success criteria and measurable outcomes.
• Propose at least 3 areas where AI tooling, automation, or platform abstraction can significantly accelerate delivery velocity.

Success Metrics – Beyond 30 Days

• Time-to-delivery and stability of AI applications in production.
• Number of reusable components, templates, or frameworks adopted across teams.
• Customer satisfaction and business value delivered through strategic AI engagements.
• Cross-functional impact and alignment with product roadmap and infrastructure evolution.

Join us to shape the future of enterprise AI applications — where scalable infrastructure meets intelligent automation, and every layer is optimized for velocity, insight, and impact.

Apply now to lead the next generation of end-to-end AI solution delivery.

DDN

Join our dynamic and driven team, where engineering excellence is at the heart of everything we do. We seek individuals who love to challenge themselves and are fueled by curiosity. Here, you'll have the opportunity to work across various areas of the company, thanks to our flat organizational structure that encourages hands-on involvement and direct contributions to our mission. Leadership is earned by those who take initiative and consistently deliver outstanding results, both in their work ethic and deliverables, making strong prioritization skills essential. Additionally, we value strong communication skills in all our engineers and researchers, as they are crucial for the success of our teams and the company as a whole.

Interview Process: After submitting your application, one of our recruiters will review your resume. If your application passes this stage, you will be invited to a 30-minute interview during which a member of our team will ask some basic questions. If you clear the interview, you will enter the main process, which can consist of up to four interviews in total:

• Coding assessment: Often in a language of your choice.
• Systems design: Translate high-level requirements into a scalable, fault-tolerant service (depending on role).
• Real-time problem-solving: Demonstrate practical skills in a live problem-solving session.
• Meet and greet with the wider team.
• Our goal is to finish the main process in 2-3 weeks at most.

DataDirect Networks (DDN) is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity, gender expression, transgender, sex stereotyping, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, protected Veteran Status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.