Director, AI - Software Engineering

Role: Director, AI – Software Engineering

Location: North America - Remote

Department: Exa Enterprise Support Group - EESG

Reports to: CEO, Exa Capital

Role Type: Player-Coach

About Exa Capital

Exa Capital is a permanent capital holding company focused on acquiring and building vertical market software businesses. We take a long-term, stewardship-driven approach – buying and holding companies forever, and empowering leaders through a decentralized operating model. 

Position Overview

We are seeking a Director of AI – Software Engineering who is fundamentally a strong software engineer first, AI leader second.

This role is responsible for defining and executing AI strategy across a portfolio of companies, with a focus on building production-grade AI systems that materially improve software development, operational efficiency, and product competitiveness.

You will work directly with CEOs, CTOs, and VP Engineering leaders, operating as a hands-on player-coach—earning trust through execution, not authority—and driving adoption of AI solutions that deliver clear business outcomes and measurable engineering impact.

A core mandate of this role is to redefine the Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) using AI, including building and deploying coding agents, developer copilots, and AI-powered automation systems with strong guardrails, governance, and reliability, especially in regulated enterprise environments.

In this role, you will will be responsible for following areas:

AI Strategy & Portfolio Execution

• Define and execute AI      roadmap at speed, aligned to enterprise priorities and each portfolio      company’s competitive context 
• Identify and prioritize      high-impact AI use cases across: 
  • Software development 
  • Product innovation 
  • Operational efficiency 
  • Revenue enablement 
• Maintain a portfolio-wide      AI backlog with clear ROI targets, success metrics, and prioritization      frameworks 
• Redesign and      operationalize an AI-powered Software Development Lifecycle across all      stages
• Continuously evaluate      emerging technologies and make clear adopt / scale / defer decisions 
• Build and lead a lean,      high-impact AI engineering team with strong hands-on capability 
• Develop and scale      reusable playbooks, frameworks, and architecture patterns across teams 
• Strengthen internal      capability to reduce reliance on external vendors and consultants 
• Drive adoption through      structured training, change management, and AI champion networks 

Hands-On Engineering Leadership

· Operate as a hands-on player-coach, partnering directly with CTOs and engineering teams

· Build trust through deep technical contribution and delivered outcomes, not authority

· Embed within teams to unblock execution, accelerate delivery, and improve engineering effectiveness 

· Drive AI adoption with a clear focus on business outcomes (revenue, cost, efficiency) and engineering efficacy (velocity, quality, reliability) 

· Translate business priorities into executable engineering outcomes while standardizing best practices across companies 

Implement AI Powered SDLC across portfolio companies 

· Drive adoption of modern AI-assisted development tools (coding copilots, prompt-driven workflows, automated testing and debugging) 

· Establish Human + AI collaborative development workflows across engineering teams 

· Improve engineering velocity through faster iteration cycles, automated documentation, and intelligent debugging 

· Architect and build AI coding agents for code generation, testing, code review, and workflow automation 

· Deliver AI-native developer experiences that materially improve productivity and engineering output 

· Design and enforce guardrails for AI-generated code including validation, security, compliance, and policy controls 

· Implement static and dynamic validation, security scanning, and vulnerability detection 

· Ensure compliance with data protection standards (PII, secrets management, data leakage prevention) 

· Define and enforce policy workflows, approvals, and governance controls 

· Implement human-in-the-loop systems for critical decision points and risk management 

· Ensure systems meet enterprise standards for reliability, auditability, and traceability 

· Build evaluation frameworks to measure code correctness, test coverage, performance, and regression risk

End-to-End Delivery (Prototype ? Production) and M&A support

· Own end-to-end delivery from prototype to production, ensuring real-world impact 

· Execute rapid 30–90 day cycles with production-grade outcomes 

· Build systems that are scalable, observable, and maintainable by design 

· Make clear scale / iterate / stop decisions based on measurable impact

• Evaluate AI and engineering maturity during acquisitions to      inform investment decisions 
• Define standards for AI-powered development, coding agents,      and engineering platforms 
• Accelerate post-acquisition integration through shared      systems, playbooks, and reusable patterns 

Technical Governance, Data Readiness & Responsible AI

· Establish AI development standards, security protocols, and governance frameworks

· applicable across diverse portfolio companies

· Partner with IT and data teams to assess data readiness and enable responsible access and

· integration for AI use cases

· Guide build-vs-buy decisions for AI capabilities, evaluating third-party tools against custom

· development with disciplined cost-benefit analysis

· Establish and enforce responsible AI and data-handling guidelines, including clear governance

· processes for approvals, risk review, and human-in-the-loop controls

· Ensure AI implementations align with data privacy regulations, security requirements, and

· compliance obligations

· Maintain documentation to support audit and regulatory readiness

Team Building, Change Management & Capability Development

· Build and lead a small, high-impact AI enablement team; coordinate with external specialists and vendors as needed

· Drive adoption through structured change management, training, and communications alongside solution delivery

· Build repeatable AI playbooks, frameworks, and documentation that enable portfolio company self-sufficiency over time

· Develop talent assessment frameworks to help portfolio companies build and retain AI/ML capabilities

Required Experience

• Advanced degree in Computer Science
• 10+ years of software engineering experience with recent      hands-on experience
• 2+ years of engineering director experience, including      managing managers
• Deep experience with AI infrastructure and LLMs
• Experience building large-scale query processing or      distributed systems
• Strong track record of recruiting and growing technical teams
• Excellent collaboration and communication skills across global      organizations

Strongly Preferred Experience

• Experience building      coding agents or developer copilots 
• Familiarity with: 
  • RAG (retrieval-augmented       generation) 
  • Agent frameworks 
  • Prompt engineering and       evaluation 
• Experience in regulated      industries (finance, healthcare, etc.) 
• Experience in private      equity, venture capital, or multi-company environments 
• Background in: 
  • Developer productivity       platforms 
  • Platform engineering or       internal tooling 
• Experience building AI      centers of excellence or transformation programs

What You’ll Learn & Gain

• Ownership of AI strategy      across multiple real businesses 
• Direct influence with      CEOs, CTOs, and investors 
• Exposure to M&A and      post-acquisition transformation 
• Ability to define      next-generation AI-powered software development 
• Tangible, measurable      impact on engineering and business outcomes

Who You Are

• A hands-on builder who      writes code and ships systems 
• Equally credible with      engineers and executives 
• Focused on real outcomes,      not experiments or hype 
• Strong in both system      design and business impact 
• Pragmatic—balances speed      with safety and quality 
• Comfortable operating      across multiple companies simultaneously 
• A change leader who      drives adoption through trust, clarity, and results 

What Success Looks Like (First 3–6 Months)

• AI-powered SDLC      implemented across multiple teams 
• Coding agents and      copilots adopted in real developer workflows 
• Measurable improvements      in: 
  • Engineering velocity 
  • Code quality 
  • Test coverage 
• 3–5 production-grade AI      systems deployed per company 
• Demonstrated ROI through:      
  • Cost reduction 
  • Productivity gains 
  • Revenue impact 

Why Exa

· Permanent capital: build AI capabilities designed to last decades, not optimized for exits 

· Decentralized model: portfolio CEOs own outcomes—you act as a strategic force-multiplier, not a control layer 

· Direct access to the CEO on AI strategy, acquisitions, and portfolio priorities 

· The opportunity to shape what “great AI” looks like across an entire software portfolio 

· A culture of high standards, low ego, discipline, and intellectual honesty 

· Visible, tangible impact—your work will influence products, margins, and competitiveness in real time 

· A chance to help build a new kind of software holding company, with AI as a core advantage