AI Squad Lead

Pentana Solutions has been powering the Australian automotive industry for over 50 years. We're continuing to invest significantly in our product, further enhancing our existing platform with a modern AI-led approach. Around 1 in 3 of our staff use internal AI tools every business day. The work is real, the customers are demanding, and we're hiring.
The opportunity:
Pentana AI is our dedicated AI and machine learning business unit, built to drive advanced AI capability, automation and intelligent product features across our enterprise software suite. We're looking for an AI Squad Lead to build and run a dedicated team of AI Engineers, with a strong focus on R&D, rapid prototyping and proofs-of-concept, alongside AI-led internal efficiency projects across the business.
This is a hands-on technical leadership role. You'll line-manage the team day to day, but you'll also stay close enough to the work to review architecture, arbitrate technical decisions and act as the escalation point when things get stuck. You'll report to Sean Redmond, Strategic Product Manager AI, and work closely with Andre Roza as executive sponsor.
Why this role exists right now:
Pentana AI is scaling up, and the team of AI Engineers driving our R&D and prototyping work needs a dedicated technical lead. Right now that leadership capacity doesn't exist. Your job is to give the team direction, credibility and a clear escalation path, while keeping the R&D roadmap moving from idea to proof-of-concept to real business impact.
What you'll bring:
• A strong software engineering or development background, with a solid understanding of the full software development life cycle.• Proven experience leading and mentoring a technical team, ideally software or AI/ML engineers.• Solid grounding in AI/ML concepts, large language models, API integrations and prompt engineering.• Experience managing R&D pipelines, including rapid prototyping and building proofs-of-concept.• Strong stakeholder management, able to translate business and department needs into technical solutions.• Sharp prioritisation, problem-solving and escalation management skills.• Hands-on coding in Python, C# .NET or JavaScript, cloud AI deployment experience (Azure AI, AWS), and an understanding of data privacy, security and AI governance are all highly regarded, though not essential.
What to expect:
This is a people-first leadership role with a real technical core, not a purely hands-off management position. You'll be in the room for architecture calls and code reviews as much as one-on-ones and roadmap planning. It's based in Mount Waverley, five days a week, so you'll be alongside the team you're leading every day.
What's in it for you:
• Genuine ownership. You'll build the leadership function for a brand new AI engineering team from the ground up.• Direct line to the exec sponsor. We're backing this team to move fast.• Real influence over the R&D roadmap, not just delivery against someone else's plan.• High-impact work. What you build here touches both customer-facing product and how Pentana runs internally.
We're all about celebrating diversity and creating an inclusive, respectful team. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, including Indigenous Australians, people of colour, LGBTIQA+, and those with disabilities.
If you want to build and lead the team shaping how AI gets used at Pentana, we should talk. Apply now.