Full-Time
Director of Design Engineering
Babel Street
201-500 employees
AI-powered data-to-knowledge platform delivering real-time insights
Compensation Overview
$140k - $170k/yr
Cambridge, MA, USA + 1 more
More locations: Reston, VA, USA
Hybrid
 Software Engineering (1) |
|---|
- 10+ years of experience delivering UX/UI design + front-end engineering for modern web applications (or equivalent depth)
- Strong portfolio demonstrating shipped product work (not just concepts)—including complex workflows and/or data-rich applications
- Proficiency building production UIs with React and TypeScript (or comparable modern framework experience)
- Fluency in human-centered design methods: user interviews, task analysis, prototyping, usability testing, and iterative delivery
- Strong product instincts: can translate ambiguity into clear workflows, make smart tradeoffs, and ship in increments
- Experience integrating with APIs and data services; comfort collaborating on interface contracts and edge cases
- Working knowledge of accessibility (WCAG fundamentals), performance basics, and secure UI patterns (authentication, RBAC-aware UX)
- Own the AI-first user experience for intelligence workflows
- Design and implement workflows where AI meaningfully reduces cognitive load (e.g., investigation setup, triage, summarization, entity linking, report generation, alert review)
- Build “AI-in-the-flow” patterns: inline suggestions, copilots, agent task panels, explainable recommendations, smart defaults, and guided wizards—without turning the product into a chat box
- Define interaction patterns for agentic experiences (tasking, progress, tool calls, approvals, undo/redo, auditability, and fail-safe fallbacks)
- Conduct lightweight user research (interviews, usability tests, workflow observation) and translate insights into journey maps, task flows, wireframes, prototypes, and shipped UI
- Partner with Product to clarify user problems, success criteria, and tradeoffs—then execute quickly and iteratively
- Ensure the UX supports novice-to-expert progression (discoverability for new users, speed and power features for experts)
- Implement designs in a modern front-end stack (typically React + TypeScript), delivering clean, testable, accessible, performant UI
- Build reusable components and patterns; contribute to (or lead) a design system using tools like Figma + Storybook
- Instrument experiences with analytics/telemetry to measure adoption, workflow success, and time-to-insight improvements
- Design for “evidence-first” outputs: citations, sources, confidence indicators, what-changed diffs, and clear user controls
- Implement guardrails in the UI: policy-aware interactions, redaction/PII-aware patterns (where applicable), and safe failure modes
- Close the loop with feedback: capture user ratings, corrections, and outcomes to improve models and workflows over time
- Work daily with Product, AI/ML, and Backend teams to define API contracts, data needs, latency targets, and UX acceptance criteria
- Raise the bar on craft: advocate for coherent UX, consistent patterns, and high-quality delivery—while keeping momentum and pragmatism
- Mentor others informally through design critiques, code reviews, and clear communication
Babel Street provides an AI-powered data-to-knowledge platform that delivers real-time insights to support mission-critical decisions across sectors such as finance, transportation, entertainment, sports, higher education, and hospitality. The platform enables global data discovery, enrichment, and management with scalable analytics and visualization, accessible via subscription and tailored solutions. Core capabilities include multi- and cross-lingual search in over 200 languages, situational awareness, operational risk, cyber risk, brand management, supply chain, competitive intelligence, and compliance. By turning vast digital data into timely, actionable intelligence, Babel Street helps organizations monitor risks, protect people and assets, and sustain business continuity.
Company Size
201-500
Company Stage
Debt Financing
Total Funding
$3.2M
Headquarters
Reston, Virginia
Founded
2009
Simplify's Take
What believers are saying
- Early users report Insights Investigator cuts research time by more than 50%.
- June 2026 image analysis can expand investigations into visual intelligence workflows.
- Agent-to-agent interoperability can make Babel Street a default layer for external AI systems.
What critics are saying
- Palantir and Cellebrite already commoditize analyst-assist workflows in federal accounts.
- Rights-cleared datasets create licensing bottlenecks that can abruptly disable core product capabilities.
- Civil-liberties scrutiny over location and social-media monitoring can delay contracts and restrict features.
What makes Babel Street unique
- Babel Street unifies rights-cleared multilingual data, identity resolution, and AI investigations.
- Insights Investigator lets analysts direct agentic workflows while preserving audit trails and citations.
- John Larson brings Booz Allen-grade AI scaling experience into productization and federal go-to-market.
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Benefits
Health Insurance
401(k) Retirement Plan
401(k) Company Match
Unlimited Paid Time Off
Paid Holidays
Tuition Reimbursement
Growth & Insights and Company News
6 month growth
↑ 0%1 year growth
↑ 0%2 year growth
↑ 10%Babel Street, a risk intelligence company, has announced its 2026 roadmap focused on "Agentic Risk Intelligence", deploying AI agents to execute complex intelligence workflows whilst maintaining human oversight and verifiable evidence. The company's approach enables analysts to direct AI agents that process massive datasets to extract entities and detect risks at machine speed. All findings include clear citations and source provenance for validation in high-stakes decision-making. Beginning this spring, Babel Street will release its first agentic workflows for tasks including vendor vetting, identity investigations and threat intelligence. The platform will also support agent-to-agent interoperability, allowing other AI systems to interact with Babel Street's platform. The company recently expanded its leadership team, appointing John Larson as president and chief AI officer and Rob Lalumondier as chief revenue officer.
Babel Street taps John Larson as president, CAIO. On December 2, Babel Street announced John Larson has joined the company as president and chief AI officer. This marks a major expansion of the company's executive leadership, where he will lead efforts to scale Babel Street's AI advantage and accelerate the next generation of product innovation, the company said. A nationally recognized AI and technology leader, Larson brings more than two decades of experience building high-performance AI organizations. He joins Babel Street after serving as executive vice president and head of artificial intelligence at Booz Allen Hamilton, where he played a pivotal role in establishing and reinforcing the firm's position as the leading provider of AI services to the U.S. federal government - a distinction the company has held since GFY 2022 and corroborated by industry analysts. Under his leadership, Booz Allen's dedicated AI portfolio grew at a compound rate exceeding 30% annually, scaling from an emerging contributor in the low hundreds of millions to approximately $800 million by fiscal year 2025, with continued strong growth momentum into fiscal 2026. His impact earned him recognition as one of the Top AI Executives to Watch in 2025. While at Booze Allen Hamilton, he launched a series of reusable mission-aligned AI products, established industry-shaping partnerships with NVIDIA, AWS, and next-generation AI start-ups, and built responsible AI governance frameworks that accelerated secure, explainable AI adoption across defense, intelligence, and civil agencies. Prior to this, Larson held senior leadership roles at IHS Markit (now S&P Global), Deloitte, IBM, and PwC. As Babel Street's president and chief AI officer, Larson will direct the company's technology strategy, expand its intelligence advantage, and drive the next generation of capabilities that help organizations detect risk earlier. "John is one of the most transformative AI leaders in the industry," said Benji Hutchinson, CEO of Babel Street. "He has built and scaled AI programs at a level few executives have achieved. His leadership will position Babel Street to expand our platform capabilities to deliver even greater value to our customers operating in high-stakes, high-complexity environments. John will help Babel Street continue to earn a place as a trusted technology partner for the world's most advanced identity intelligence and risk operations." "Babel Street leads the sector in mission-grade risk intelligence with the most expansive data sources and access worldwide," Larson said. "I'm excited to further that advantage with AI to amplify risk detection and make these powerful capabilities accessible to more organizations - and the personnel - that stand on the front lines of risk. When we detect threats sooner and respond with precision, we protect more people and strengthen our national resilience." Don't miss out - become a paid subscriber to IC News, and lock in subscription rates at 2025 prices. You'll get full access to breaking news from across the IC contracting space, with new articles each weekday.
Maura Burns joins Babel Street. On November 25, Babel Street announced that Maura Burns, former chief operating officer of the Central Intelligence Agency, will join its board of advisors. In this role, she will advise Babel Street on national security mission requirements and deepening public-private partnerships across the intelligence and defense communities. Burns was COO for the Central Intelligence Agency until her retirement in 2025 after a 37-year career. In this role, she directed enterprise-level day-to-day global business functions and spearheaded strategic initiatives to modernize technology and strengthen organizational resilience. She built strong partnerships with the private sector to accelerate the adoption of cutting-edge technologies, including artificial intelligence, advanced cybersecurity systems, and next-generation technical collection platforms, ensuring mission success at scale. Prior to this, she was the CIA's assistant director of the Weapons and Counterproliferation Mission Center, responsible for worldwide weapons analysis, operations, and collection. "Throughout my career, I've seen firsthand how critical it is to connect the right data, people, and technology to stay ahead," said Burns. "Babel Street's mission-grade approach to risk and intelligence is exactly what the government and industry need to safeguard national security and critical infrastructure, and I'm honored to help guide the company's next phase of growth." "Maura brings unparalleled expertise at the intersection of national security, intelligence operations, and technology innovation," said Benji Hutchinson, CEO of Babel Street. "Her deep understanding of the evolving threat landscape and proven track record of modernizing critical capabilities will be invaluable as we continue to deliver mission-grade solutions to our government and commercial customers navigating an increasingly complex global environment."
Babel Street appoints Arun Sankaran Executive Vice President of Threat and Vendor Risk Solutions.
Michael Ivahnenko, a seasoned national security professional with more than 25 years of experience in both the public and private sectors, has joined Babel Street as an Account Executive according to a LinkedIn post.