Head of AI Foundation Models & World-Model Systems

Merlinlabs; Boston (MA); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

401(k) with match

Unlimited vacation

Hybrid work in Boston HQ

Job summary

Merlin Labs in Boston, MA is hiring a senior AI systems leader to drive world-model and post-training efforts for autonomous flight. You will design deterministic interfaces to the autonomy stack, lead a small engineering team, and define evaluation criteria and safety requirements for model releases.

This role supports hybrid work with a preference for Boston-based relocation. The position requires extensive experience in AI systems, PyTorch, and production-grade robotics or aerospace

Qualifications

• Degree in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Computer Engineering, Applied Math, or related field.
• 8+ years building AI systems.
• 3+ years leading technical teams or owning a major model program.
• Proven track record shipping AI-powered models into production in regulated or real-time environments.
• Strong PyTorch experience; able to read and reason about C++ real-time systems.
• Clear technical communication for engineers, safety, and regulators.

Responsibilities

• Own Merlin's foundation and world-model work — architecture selection and roadmap.
• Lead and mentor a small team of world-model engineers; set technical bar and review culture.
• Design model interfaces to the autonomy stack with deterministic verifier-compatible outputs.
• Define success criteria and build evaluation harnesses, taxonomy, and regression suites.
• Establish uncertainty quantification and out-of-distribution detection as first-class outputs for safety.
• Benchmark learned planning against current rule-based systems across mission profiles.
• Collaborate with Certification and Systems Engineering to keep designs defendable to regulators.
• Track external research frontier and make disciplined choices on adoption.

Job description

Merlin Labs in Boston, MA is hiring a senior AI systems leader to drive world-model and post-training efforts for autonomous flight. You will design deterministic interfaces to the autonomy stack, lead a small engineering team, and define evaluation criteria and safety requirements for model releases.

This role supports hybrid work with a preference for Boston-based relocation. The position requires extensive experience in AI systems, PyTorch, and production-grade robotics or aerospace