Head of Physical AI Engineering & Data Platform

Scale AI; California (MO); On-site; USD 302,000 - 378,000; Full time

Job summary

Scale AI in San Francisco is seeking a Director of Engineering for the Physical AI team to own the execution of the Data Engine powering robotics research and real-world deployment.

You will lead a multidisciplinary org, guide platform architecture, and collaborate with Operations and GTM to solve data bottlenecks. The role includes travel and the responsibility to scale teams while maintaining quality.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Robotics, Computer Science, or a related technical field.
• 8+ years of engineering experience in fast-paced environments, including 4+ years direct people management demonstrated history of recruiting, mentoring, and developing high-performing technical teams through rapid growth and change
• Experience leading technical execution for complex hardware-software systems, with deep domain knowledge in Robotics, Autonomous Vehicles, Computer Vision, and/or Machine Learning strongly preferred
• Deep fluency in the ML development lifecycle - training pipelines, data flywheels, and evaluation frameworks as systems you've built and owned
• Comfortable leading teams across Python, C++, and TypeScript/Node stacks, distributed systems, cloud infrastructure (AWS, Kubernetes), and workflow orchestration (Temporal, Airflow)
• Proven ability to independently navigate, execute effectively amidst ambiguity, and strong attention to detail
• Strong operator and communicator to create tight feedback loops between teams, surface problems early, and drive decisions with clarity across technical and executive audiences

Responsibilities

• Set and drive the technical vision across data collection infrastructure, teleoperation systems, ML training pipelines, model evaluation frameworks, annotation tooling, and research
• Lead a multidisciplinary engineering organization - spanning engineering managers, software engineers, ML engineers, and ML research scientists - while designing the organizational structure, talent strategy, and culture required to scale rapidly without compromising on quality or strategic alignment
• Maintain exceptional technical and operational excellence by deeply understanding team deliverables, asking incisive questions, identifying slipping standards early, and knowing precisely when to step in
• Drive cross-functional alignment across Engineering, Operations, and GTM on platform architecture, release processes, and shared priorities
• Collaborate with researchers and clients to architect and deliver scalable, production-grade data infrastructure tailored for complex robotics workloads

Skills

Python

C++

TypeScript/Node

ML

Robotics

AWS

Kubernetes

Temporal/Airflow

Leadership/People Mgmt

Education

Bachelor's degree in Engineering/Robotics/Computer Science

Tools

AWS

Kubernetes

Temporal

Airflow

Job description

Scale AI in San Francisco is seeking a Director of Engineering for the Physical AI team to own the execution of the Data Engine powering robotics research and real-world deployment.

You will lead a multidisciplinary org, guide platform architecture, and collaborate with Operations and GTM to solve data bottlenecks. The role includes travel and the responsibility to scale teams while maintaining quality.