MLOps Engineer - Outside IR35

This is an exciting contract opportunity for an MLOps Engineer to join an experienced team in a new customer engagement working at the forefront of data analytics and AI. This role offers the chance to take a key role in the design and delivery of advanced AI solutions within the Azure ecosystem. Key Responsibilities: • Design, build, and maintain integrations using Model Context Protocol (MCP) to connect LLMs with internal tools, APIs, and services. • Develop production-ready software using modern engineering practices, including object-oriented design, modular architecture, testing, version control, and CI/CD pipelines. • Contribute to the development of our MLOps framework, supporting AI and data workflows built on Databricks and Mosaic AI. • Apply appropriate software design patterns and engineering paradigms (e.g., OOP, functional, event-driven) to solve real platform and integration problems. • Participate actively in code reviews, technical discussions, and design sessions, contributing ideas while learning from senior engineers. • Collaborate closely with machine learning, data, and product teams to deliver robust, well-integrated AI features and platform capabilities. • Help maintain high standards of code quality, maintainability, and reliability across the AI platform. Skills and Experience: • 3-5 years of professional software engineering experience building production systems. • Strong Python engineering experience, including writing modular, testable, and maintainable code suitable for production environments. • Working knowledge of C++, with the ability to read, write, and contribute to existing codebases; familiarity with Python/C++ interoperability is advantageous. • Experience building or working with tool integrations, plugin-style architectures, or API-based integrations, particularly in environments involving LLM tool calling or agent workflows. • Solid understanding of core software engineering paradigms (object-oriented, functional, event-driven) and common software design patterns, with the judgement to apply them appropriately. • Exposure to Databricks or a comparable data platform, including experience with data pipelines, jobs, or systems such as Delta Lake; comfortable working beyond notebook-only workflows. Additional Information: • Rate offered: Up to £500 per day • IR35 Status: Outside • Location: Fully remote • Start date: ASAP • Duration: 3 months initial sign up with significant opportunity for extension