Applied Robotics Engineer — Real-World RL & Embodied AI

ZHAW - Zürcher Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften; Winterthur; On-site; CHF 110,000 - 170,000; Full time

Job summary

ZHAW - Zürcher Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften in Winterthur invites applications for a postdoctoral researcher or senior robotics engineer to move lab robots into industry with Swiss partners, deploying reinforcement learning and robot foundation models on humanoid and quadruped platforms.

You will conduct applied R&D in the Embodied Mobile Agents group, publish results, contribute open-source code, and collaborate with industry and universities across Switzerland and the EU.

Qualifications

• PhD in robotics, or in computer science or a related field with a focus on AI for robotics.
• Hands-on experience with real robots, including prototyping and modifying robots with off-the-shelf equipment.
• Proven competencies in robot learning (reinforcement learning, imitation learning, robot foundation models) and in classical robotics (motion planning, perception and navigation, teleoperation).
• Strong programming skills with ROS / ROS 2, Nav2, MoveIt, PCL, OpenCV; experience with the NVIDIA Jetson ecosystem and current deep learning frameworks.
• Strong research track record in AI for robotics or computer vision, evidenced by publications.
• Fluent in English; German is a plus.
• Position level: research associate, initially limited to 2 years.

Responsibilities

• Conduct applied research and development as a senior robotics engineer / postdoctoral researcher in the Embodied Mobile Agents group.
• Deploy reinforcement learning and policies on humanoid and quadruped robots in real-world settings.
• Drive focus topics like agentic embodied AI systems and robotic foundation models.
• Collaborate with Swiss and EU partners; contribute publications and open-source code.

Skills

Reinforcement learning

Imitation learning

Robot foundation models

ROS / ROS 2

Nav2

MoveIt

OpenCV

NVIDIA Jetson

Python / C++

Publications track record

Education

PhD in robotics or AI for robotics

Tools

PCL

NVIDIA Jetson ecosystem

Job description

ZHAW - Zürcher Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften in Winterthur invites applications for a postdoctoral researcher or senior robotics engineer to move lab robots into industry with Swiss partners, deploying reinforcement learning and robot foundation models on humanoid and quadruped platforms.

You will conduct applied R&D in the Embodied Mobile Agents group, publish results, contribute open-source code, and collaborate with industry and universities across Switzerland and the EU.