Staff Applied AI Engineer - Pre-Sales

Responsibilities

Partner with sales and solution leaders to conduct technical discovery, scope AI solutions, and deliver bespoke demos for prospective clients. Develop technical proposals and Statements of Work while ensuring a smooth transition from pre-sales engagements to post-sales delivery.

Requirements

Requires a Bachelor's degree in a technical field and over 8 years of experience in customer-facing technical roles. Candidates must possess hands-on expertise in Python, modern GenAI stacks, and the ability to translate complex business problems into technical architectures.

Skills

• Python
• GenAI
• Machine learning
• RAG
• Vector databases
• Prompt engineering
• Agentic architectures
• Data processing
• Fine-tuning
• Technical discovery
• Solution scoping
• Pre-sales
• Proposal writing
• Storytelling
• Architecture design
• Predictive ML

Benefits

• Equity
• Employee stock options

About this role

About Snorkel
Snorkel AI is the frontier AI data lab, helping teams build the data and environments behind high-performing frontier and agentic AI. We combine technology with research-driven AI data development to create datasets, benchmarks, evals, and custom solutions for real-world AI systems. Founded out of the Stanford AI Lab in 2019, Snorkel works with leading AI labs and enterprises to move from better data to better outcomes.

Excited to help us redefine how AI is built? Apply to be the newest Snorkeler!
As an Applied AI Engineer (Pre-Sales), you will partner closely with Sales and our AI Solution Practice Leaders during pre-sales engagements. You will lead technical discovery and solution scoping to identify high-value use cases, and develop tailored demos and pilots that demonstrate how modern GenAI and machine learning techniques can drive measurable business outcomes. You will also translate proposed solutions into clearly scoped, technically sound proposals and Statement of Works (SOWs) that set realistic expectations and position engagements for success, while collaborating with delivery teams during initial implementation.
This role sits at the intersection of deep technical problem-solving and customer partnership. You will help customers unpack complex business challenges, quickly prototype solutions, and clearly communicate technical approaches to both engineering teams and senior business stakeholders. From early architecture discussions to demo development, you will play a key role in helping organizations adopt AI effectively while surfacing field insights that inform our product and research roadmap.
Main Responsibilities
Partner closely with Sales and our AI Solution Practice Leaders to shape technical strategy across active prospects, win technical evaluations, and ensure a seamless transition to post-sales delivery through structured handoff documentation and clear expectation alignment.
Lead structured technical discovery engagements with prospects to understand business objectives, success criteria, data landscape, architectural constraints, security considerations, and organizational readiness.
Translate discovery findings into well-defined GenAI solution architectures that demonstrate technical feasibility and business impact using internal frameworks, and complementary third-party technologies.
Design, build and deliver bespoke demos, including evaluation pipelines, dataset strategy, retrieval-augmented generation systems, fine-tuning workflows, prompt engineering strategies, and agentic architectures tailored to specific customer use cases and senior business stakeholders.
Author and contribute to custom proposals, including Statements of Work and RFP/RFI responses, ensuring scope clarity, architectural soundness, realistic effort estimates, and alignment with delivery capabilities.
Systematically capture reusable patterns from bespoke demos and evolve them into reference architectures, demo assets, benchmarks, and internal solution playbooks.
Annual travel up to 25%.
Preferred Qualifications
B.S. in Computer Science, Engineering, Math/Statistics, or equivalent experience.
8+ years in customer-facing technical roles (pre-sales, solutions engineering, or applied AI), including discovery, scoping, demos, proof-of-value engagements, and RFP responses.
Hands-on Python experience and familiarity with the modern Gen AI stack - LLM ecosystems, RAG, vector databases, data processing, synthetic dataset curation, evaluation workflows, LLM orchestration and agent authoring tools.
Expertise across the predictive ML stack, including classical ML (e.g., scikit-learn) and data processing frameworks (e.g., pandas, Spark).
Ability to operate in fast-paced environments and rapidly build prototypes (ML solutions, RAG systems, prompt-based workflows, fine-tuned models, agentic systems) that demonstrate business value.
Able to translate ambiguous business problems into testable technical approaches and measurable success criteria.
Strong presentation and storytelling skills with the ability to engage both technical and executive audiences with credibility.
Experience estimating scope and producing technical content for proposals and Statements of Work.
Compensation range is $190K - $350K OTE. All offers also include equity in the form of employee stock options. Our compensation ranges are determined by role, level, and location. Within the range, individual pay is determined by work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training.
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Actual compensation will be determined based on factors including skills, qualifications, experience, and geographic location.
Salary range(s) for this role
$190,000—$330,000 USD
Be Your Best at Snorkel
Joining Snorkel AI means becoming part of a company that has market proven solutions, robust funding, and is scaling rapidly—offering a unique combination of stability and the excitement of high growth. As a member of our team, you’ll have meaningful opportunities to shape priorities and initiatives, influence key strategic decisions, and directly impact our ongoing success. Whether you’re looking to deepen your technical expertise, explore leadership opportunities, or learn new skills across multiple functions, you’re fully supported in building your career in an environment designed for growth, learning, and shared success.
Snorkel AI is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer and is committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. Snorkel AI embraces diversity and provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment. Snorkel AI prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type on the basis of race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected b...

About Snorkel AI

Software Development · 201-500 employees · headquartered in San Francisco, California · founded 2019