Becrypt Ltd — London — Competitive
About the Role Becrypt is creating a new, standalone Principal Architect – AI role to lead the organisation’s approach to artificial intelligence across the business. This is a senior technical position for someone who can look across engineering, product, IT and operations to identify where AI can genuinely improve how Becrypt builds, secures and runs its platforms — and who can then design, build and govern the systems that make that possible. This is not a team-management role. It is a hands-on, principal-level individual contributor position for someone who leads through technical depth, credibility and influence — working closely with engineering teams, technical architects and internal IT, and setting the policies, risk frameworks and compliance guardrails needed to adopt AI responsibly. What You’ll Do Strategic & cross-business * Assess processes and systems across the business — engineering, product, customer-facing operations, internal IT — to identify where AI can add genuine value, streamline work, or reduce risk. * Act as the go-to technical authority on AI across Becrypt, working directly with engineering teams, technical architects and internal IT rather than through a reporting chain. * Develop and own AI-related policy, governance, risk assessment and compliance frameworks, balancing confidentiality, integrity, availability, usability, customer requirements, engineering effort and operational risk. * Advise leadership on AI strategy, opportunity areas and risk posture in plain, actionable terms. Platform & engineering delivery * Design and build platforms for long-running agentic workflow systems, including AI gateways and supporting infrastructure services. * Design Docker-based services using Linux container environments, Python, FastAPI, TypeScript, MCP/FastMCP, OpenAI and AWS Bedrock.Apply secure boundaries around credentials, service access, tool invocation and human-in-the-loop operation for AI/agentic systems. * Build reusable services and integrations, and assess the security, isolation, maintainability and operational implications of emerging AI technologies before they’re adopted. * Actively probe AI systems, integrations and agentic workflows for vulnerabilities — thinking like an attacker to uncover weaknesses in credential handling, tool invocation and data exposure before they’re exploited, and feeding findings back into design and policy. * Get hands-on with difficult technical problems alongside engineers — investigating, diagnosing and making architectural calls that improve security, assurance, maintainability and long term product direction. What You’ll Bring * Experience in designing, building, securing and operating complex software platforms, Linux-based systems, distributed services, APIs and integrations. * Strong, current hands-on experience with Docker/containerised environments, Python, FastAPI, TypeScript, and AI-specific tooling such as MCP/FastMCP, OpenAI APIs and AWS Bedrock. * Practical experience building or integrating AI gateways, agentic workflow systems, or similar AI infrastructure — not just using AI tools, but architecting the systems around them. * A track record of enterprise or platform architecture at principal/CTO-advisory level, ideally spanning regulated, security-conscious, or infrastructure-heavy environments (e.g. payments, cloud platforms, integration platforms). * Demonstrated ability to design policy-based authorisation, credential/access boundaries, and secure-by-design controls for systems handling sensitive operations. * Experience operating as a senior individual contributor — influencing engineering, product, security, customer-facing and leadership stakeholders without relying on formal team management. * A working mental model that balances security (CIA), usability, customer needs, engineering effort, operational risk and product strategy when making architectural decisions. * Comfortable writing and championing policy, risk and compliance documentation, not just technical designs. Nice to Have * Experience in a security-focused or highly regulated product company (Becrypt’s own domain). * Prior experience introducing AI/agentic capability into an existing engineering organisation from scratch. * Familiarity with data-centre/on-prem as well as cloud (AWS) deployment models. Success in This Role Looks Like * A clear, prioritised view of where AI can and should be applied across Becrypt, backed by policy and risk frameworks that leadership and engineering trust. * A working AI gateway / agentic platform in production use, built to Becrypt’s security and operational standards. * Engineering teams and internal IT with a clear, well-governed path to adopt AI capability safely and consistently. Package & Discretionary Benefits: 25 days annual leave plus an additional 2 days after 2 years’ service 5 days additional holiday purchase available Private medical insurance Heath cashback plan with Healthshield Pension scheme Life cover 4 x salary Season ticket loan Salary exchange benefits (ride2work, pension) Subsidised gym membership Employee referral scheme Role will be subject to an employment screening process and will require security clearance