Kong AI Gateway Engineer (Remote, United States)

At Allstate, great things happen when our people work together to protect families and their belongings from life’s uncertainties. And for more than 90 years, our innovative drive has kept us a step ahead of our customers’ evolving needs. From advocating for seat belts, air bags and graduated driving laws, to being an industry leader in pricing sophistication, telematics, and, more recently, device and identity protection.  Job Description The Software Engineer Lead Consultant will serve as a technical lead focused on Kong AI Gateway, bringing strong experience in API Gateway management, Kong administration, and AI/LLM proxy development. This role will architect, design, build, test, and support modern digital products, while owning applications through production and driving their overall success against key performance goals. Candidates must be able to work Central Time or Eastern Time hours. Required Skills • Kong Gateway (OSS/Enterprise), Kong Konnect • API Management & API Lifecycle Management • AI Gateway / LLM Proxy Development • OpenAI / Azure OpenAI Integration • REST APIs, GraphQL • OAuth2, JWT, OIDC, API Security • Kubernetes, Docker, Helm • CI/CD (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps) • Monitoring: Prometheus, Grafana, ELK/Splunk • Cloud Platforms: Azure, AWS, or GCP • Kong AI Gateway Configuration & Administration • LLM Traffic Routing, Load Balancing and Failover Management • Prompt Management, Prompt Security and Guardrails • AI Security, Responsible AI and Model Governance • Token Usage Monitoring, Rate Limiting and Cost Optimization • Multi-LLM Integration (OpenAI, Azure OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, Google Gemini, Mistral, Llama) • Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) Architecture Concepts • Vector Databases • LLMOps, AI Observability and Model Performance Monitoring • AI API Governance, Compliance and Data Protection • Prompt Caching, Semantic Caching and Response Optimization • Model Gateway Policy Development and AI Consumption Controls • MCP (Model Context Protocol) and AI Agent Integration Concepts • GenAI Platform Engineering and Enterprise AI Enablement   Key Responsibilities   • Design and implement enterprise-grade AI Gateway solutions using Kong AI Gateway.   • Configure AI-specific policies including prompt logging, content filtering, token controls, and guardrails. • Enable secure access to multiple LLM providers through a unified gateway architecture. • Implement AI observability, token analytics, usage tracking, and cost governance. • Develop routing strategies across multiple AI models based on latency, cost, and availability. • Integrate RAG-based AI services through secure API management frameworks. • Ensure compliance with enterprise AI governance, security, and regulatory requirements. • Establish AI platform standards, reusable AI APIs, and best practices for GenAI adoption. • Support AI agent and MCP-based integrations within enterprise ecosystems. • Drive AI platform reliability, scalability, and operational excellence. • Configure, administer, and support Kong Gateway environments. • Develop and manage AI Gateway proxies for GenAI/LLM services. • Implement API security, authentication, throttling, and governance policies. • Integrate AI platforms such as Azure OpenAI and OpenAI through secure API gateways. • Deploy and manage Kong in Kubernetes-based environments. • Monitor, troubleshoot, and optimize gateway performance and availability. • Automate deployments and operational processes using DevOps tools.   Experience • 8 Plus years of experience in API Management, Middleware, or Platform Engineering. • Minimum 3 to 5 years of hands-on experience with Kong Gateway Administration. • Experience with cloud-native and microservices architectures pr