We’re building a world of health around every individual — shaping a more connected, convenient and compassionate health experience. At CVS Health®, you’ll be surrounded by passionate colleagues who care deeply, innovate with purpose, hold ourselves accountable and prioritize safety and quality in everything we do. Join us and be part of something bigger – helping to simplify health care one person, one family and one community at a time.
Position Summary
As a Principal AI Engineer, you will set the technical direction for how we design, build, and operate enterprise-grade GenAI and agentic AI systems in a regulated healthcare environment. You will be a hands-on technical leader who works across data science, clinical, product, security, privacy, legal, and business teams to turn strategic priorities into trustworthy, scalable, production AI solutions. You will report to the Lead Director on the Commercial team in our Aetna Technology organization.
What You Will Do
- Architect and deliver production-grade GenAI and agentic AI solutions, including RAG, vector search, model integration, tool orchestration, guardrails, and evaluation across AWS and/or GCP.
- Build scalable, cloud-native AI systems using serverless/event-driven architectures, APIs, CI/CD, infrastructure-as-code, and modern software engineering practices.
- Own the production AI lifecycle, from experimentation and deployment through monitoring, observability, performance, cost optimization, and continuous improvement.
- Establish secure and responsible AI practices that address privacy, security, governance, auditability, model risk, and appropriate human oversight in a regulated environment.
- Define AI architecture, standards, and engineering best practices for areas such as agent orchestration, RAG, tool/MCP integrations, evaluation, and enterprise AI adoption.
- Partner across product, engineering, data, security, privacy, legal, compliance, and business teams to translate strategic needs into scalable AI solutions and influence technical direction.
- Provide hands-on technical leadership through design reviews, mentorship, architecture guidance, build-vs-buy decisions, and clear technical documentation.
Required Qualifications
- 10+ years of software engineering experience, with 5+ years in solution architecture or system design.
- 5+ years building large-scale microservices and APIs (Node.js, TypeScript, Java, or Python).
- 5+ years of hands-on AWS and/or GCP experience (serverless, event-driven, CI/CD, AI/ML).
- Hands-on experience with AWS Bedrock (models, agents, knowledge bases, guardrails, tuning, evaluation) or GCP Vertex AI (Model Garden, Agent Builder, Vector Search, Pipelines, Tuning), or equivalent.
- Production experience with agentic AI frameworks, RAG architectures, and vector databases.
- Strong Python skills for AI/ML engineering.
- Demonstrated experience delivering AI/ML systems in regulated environments with security, privacy, and audit requirements.
- Track record of influencing technical direction across multiple teams without direct authority.
Preferred Qualifications
- Healthcare, life sciences, or other regulated-industry experience, including HIPAA and PHI handling.
- Experience with Vertex AI Generative AI Studio, vector search orchestration, and agent capabilities.
- Experience with LLM evaluation tooling and observability platforms (e.g., LangSmith, Arize, Langfuse, Ragas, or cloud-native equivalents).
- Experience with MCP servers and tool integration, agent-to-agent patterns, and agent memory design.
- Experience with infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, CDK), containers, and Kubernetes.
- Experience with fine-tuning techniques (LoRA/PEFT, distillation) and open-weight models.
- Familiarity with AI governance frameworks (NIST AI RMF, ISO 42001) and model risk management.
- Agile/SAFe experience in large enterprises.
- Cloud certifications (AWS, GCP, or Azure).
- Publications, patents, or open-source contributions in AI/ML.
Education
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience (High School diploma + 4 years of relevant experience).
Pay Range
The typical pay range for this role is:
$144,200.00 - $288,400.00
This pay range represents the base hourly rate or base annual full-time salary for all positions in the job grade within which this position falls. The actual base salary offer will depend on a variety of factors including experience, education, geography and other relevant factors. This position is eligible for a CVS Health bonus, commission or short-term incentive program in addition to the base pay range listed above. This position also includes an award target in the company’s equity award program.
Our people fuel our future. Our teams reflect the customers, patients, members and communities we serve and we are committed to fostering a workplace where every colleague feels valued and that they belong.
Great benefits for great people
We take pride in offering a comprehensive and competitive mix of pay and benefits that reflects our commitment to our colleagues and their families.
Additional details about available benefits are provided during the application process and on Benefits Moments.
Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state and local laws.
Skills Required
- 10+ years of software engineering experience
- 5+ years of solution architecture or system design experience
- 5+ years building large-scale microservices and APIs using Node.js, TypeScript, Java, or Python
- 5+ years of hands-on AWS and/or GCP experience, including serverless, event-driven, CI/CD, and AI/ML
- Hands-on experience with AWS Bedrock, GCP Vertex AI, or equivalent
- Production experience with agentic AI frameworks, RAG architectures, and vector databases
- Strong Python skills for AI/ML engineering
- Experience delivering AI/ML systems in regulated environments with security, privacy, and audit requirements
- Experience influencing technical direction across multiple teams without direct authority
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience
- Healthcare, life sciences, or other regulated-industry experience, including HIPAA and PHI handling
- Experience with Vertex AI Generative AI Studio, vector search orchestration, and agent capabilities
- Experience with LLM evaluation tooling and observability platforms
- Experience with MCP servers, tool integration, agent-to-agent patterns, and agent memory design
- Experience with infrastructure-as-code, containers, and Kubernetes
- Experience with fine-tuning techniques such as LoRA, PEFT, distillation, and open-weight models
- Familiarity with AI governance frameworks and model risk management
- Agile or SAFe experience in large enterprises
- Cloud certification in AWS, GCP, or Azure
- Publications, patents, or open-source contributions in AI/ML
CVS Health Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about CVS Health and has not been reviewed or approved by CVS Health.
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Healthcare Strength — Health coverage includes medical, dental, and vision with HSA-eligible options, free preventive care, virtual care, and access to MinuteClinic services. Mental-health resources such as counseling support are emphasized, and coverage is often considered solid for full-time colleagues.
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Retirement Support — A dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 5% after one year and an Employee Stock Purchase Plan are consistently highlighted in Total Rewards materials. Feedback suggests retirement programs are a meaningful strength within the overall package.
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Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — Wellbeing offerings include up to 20 no-cost counseling sessions per issue, backup care, tuition assistance, and substantial in-store discounts, alongside broader wellness tools. These everyday perks expand value beyond base pay and can be especially meaningful for full-time schedules.
CVS Health Insights
What We Do
CVS Health is the leading health solutions company that delivers care in ways no one else can. We reach people in more ways and improve the health of communities across America through our local presence, digital channels and our nearly 300,000 dedicated colleagues – including more than 40,000 physicians, pharmacists, nurses and nurse practitioners. Wherever and whenever people need us, we help them with their health – whether that’s managing chronic diseases, staying compliant with their medications, or accessing affordable health and wellness services in the most convenient ways. We help people navigate the health care system – and their personal health care – by improving access, lowering costs and being a trusted partner for every meaningful moment of health. And we do it all with heart, each and every day.
