Founding AI Engineer (Vision-language models)

Jack; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Jack is hiring a Founding AI Engineer for an early-stage SF startup building AI smart glasses for field teams. You’ll own the AI core: vision-language models running on real hardware in the field, not just prompts.

You will build a production VLM pipeline, data eval flywheel, edge inference, and on-prem fine-tuning of open models to enable real-time decision support for technicians in data centers, energy, and aerospace.

Qualifications

• Hands-on training with vision-language or video models (not just API calls).
• Experience at a self-driving, robotics, AR, or top AI lab or funded AI startup.
• At least 1 year of work in this area or a notable publication in a top venue.
• Built agent loops with real tool use, not only RAG or chatbots.

Responsibilities

• Own production AI core: vision-language models on real hardware in the field.
• Build and maintain a production VLM pipeline for glasses and inspections.
• Oversee eval harnesses, data flywheel, and fine-tuning for releases.
• Implement edge inference and model orchestration robust to connectivity/latency.
• Develop real-time voice and video interfaces for the glasses.
• Fine-tune open models for on-prem deployments.

Skills

Hands-on training

Vision-language models

Agent loops with tools

US-based SF office

Job description

We're recruiting a Founding AI Engineer for an early-stage SF startup building AI smart glasses for field teams. Think technicians in data centers, energy and aerospace getting a co-pilot that sees what they see and walks them through the job.

You'd own the AI core: vision-language models running on real hardware, out in the field.

What you'd own:

• A production agentic VLM pipeline on the glasses: multi-step, tool-using visual reasoning against real inspections and procedures
• The eval and data flywheel: eval harnesses, failure capture, and customer data feeding fine-tunes that make each release better
• Edge inference and model orchestration that holds up when connectivity and latency get rough
• Real-time voice and video interfaces for the glasses
• Fine-tuning open models (SFT, RLHF, quantization) for on-prem deployments

You're probably a fit if you have:

• Hands‑on training, fine‑tuning or post‑training of a vision‑language or video model. Not just prompting or calling an API.
• Done that work at a self‑driving, robotics, AR, top AI lab or funded AI startup
• About a year or more of that work, or a paper at a top venue
• Built agent loops with real tool use, not just RAG or a chatbot
• You're based in the US and can be in the SF office 5 days a week

Who this isn't for:

• IT services, consulting or non‑tech enterprise backgrounds
• A run of short startup stints under a year
• Pure researchers who've never shipped to real users
• Language‑only LLM folks with no vision work
• Anyone outside the US right now

Pay: $180K to $230K base plus 0.25% to 0.75% equity.

Visa: OPT or H-1B transfers are fine. They can't sponsor a new visa.