Head of Physical AI Programs

Centific Global Solutions, Inc.; East Palo Alto (CA); On-site; USD 300,000 - 350,000; Full time

Job summary

Centific Global Solutions, Inc. is seeking a Head of Physical AI Programs in East Palo Alto, California. This role demands a visionary to define and execute Centific's Physical AI strategy, leading large-scale applications and building partnerships within the robotics and AI sectors.

The ideal candidate should possess over 12 years of experience, a strong understanding of robotics, and operational leadership skills. The position offers a competitive salary starting at $300k OTE and opportunities for growth in an innovative environment.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of experience leading large-scale programs within robotics, AI, or related fields.
• Proven track record building new business units or operational organizations.
• Strong operational leadership experience with global teams.

Responsibilities

• Define and execute the Physical AI vision, roadmap, and growth strategy.
• Lead strategic customer engagements and oversee complex Physical AI programs.
• Develop strategic relationships with industry leaders and technology partners.

Skills

Leadership in robotics

Understanding of autonomous systems

Expertise in AI and industrial automation

Experience in program execution

Job description

Company Overview

Centific is a frontier AI data foundry that curates diverse, high‑quality data, using our purpose‑built technology platforms to empower the Magnificent Seven and our enterprise clients with safe, scalable AI deployment. Our team includes more than 150 PhDs and data scientists, along with more than 4,000 AI practitioners and engineers. We harness the power of an integrated solution ecosystem—comprising industry‑leading partnerships and 1.8 million vertical domain experts in more than 230 markets—to create contextual, multilingual, pre‑trained datasets; fine‑tuned, industry‑specific LLMs; and RAG pipelines supported by vector databases. Our zero‑distance innovation™ solutions for GenAI can reduce GenAI costs by up to 80% and bring solutions to market 50% faster. Our mission is to bridge the gap between AI creators and industry leaders by bringing best practices in GenAI to unicorn innovators and enterprise customers. We aim to help these organizations unlock significant business value by deploying GenAI at scale, helping to ensure they stay at the forefront of technological advancement and maintain a competitive edge in their respective markets.

Position Summary

We are seeking a visionary and execution‑oriented Head of Physical AI Programs to lead the development and scaling of Centific’s Physical AI practice. This executive will be responsible for defining strategy, building operational capabilities, establishing strategic partnerships, and delivering large‑scale Physical AI programs for leading AI labs, robotics companies, autonomous systems providers, and enterprise customers. The ideal candidate combines deep expertise in robotics, embodied AI, autonomous systems, simulation, reinforcement learning, and large‑scale program execution with a strong understanding of how AI data, human intelligence, and operational excellence come together to accelerate Physical AI development. This role will serve as the executive leader responsible for transforming Physical AI from an emerging capability into a strategic growth engine for Centific.

Key Responsibilities

• Physical AI Strategy & Practice Leadership
  • Define and execute Centific’s Physical AI vision, roadmap, and growth strategy.
  • Build a differentiated Physical AI services and platform offering spanning data, simulation, training, validation, benchmarking, and reinforcement learning.
  • Establish Centers of Excellence focused on robotics, autonomous systems, humanoids, industrial automation, warehouse robotics, and embodied AI.
  • Identify emerging market opportunities and translate them into scalable business offerings.
• Program Leadership & Delivery
  • Lead strategic customer engagements from concept through execution.
  • Own end‑to‑end delivery of complex Physical AI programs involving robotics data collection, simulation, teleoperations, RLHF, RLAIF, benchmarking, and validation.
  • Establish delivery frameworks, operating models, quality standards, and program governance mechanisms.
  • Drive operational excellence across globally distributed teams.
• Ecosystem & Partnerships
  • Develop strategic relationships with robotics companies, AI labs, autonomous systems providers, universities, and technology partners.
  • Collaborate with industry leaders across robotics, simulation, synthetic data, and AI infrastructure ecosystems.
  • Represent Centific at industry events, conferences, customer briefings, and executive forums.
• Product & Platform Innovation
  • Partner with Product, Engineering, and Research teams to shape the roadmap for Physical AI capabilities within AIDF.
  • Drive innovation across Robotics Data Collection, Simulation Data Generation, Human‑in‑the‑Loop Operations, Reinforcement Learning, Physical AI Benchmarking, Synthetic Data Pipelines, Safety & Validation Frameworks, Embodied Agent Evaluation.
  • Business Development & Growth: Support strategic pursuits and executive‑level customer engagements.
  • Develop solution frameworks and go‑to‑market strategies for Physical AI opportunities.
  • Build a multi‑year pipeline across robotics, manufacturing, logistics, mobility, healthcare, defense, and industrial automation sectors.
  • Contribute to revenue growth and strategic account expansion.
• Team Building
  • Recruit and develop a world‑class Physical AI organization.
  • Build multidisciplinary teams spanning robotics, simulation, AI data operations, program management, research, and engineering.
  • Foster a culture of innovation, operational rigor, and customer obsession.

Required Qualifications

• 12+ years of experience leading large‑scale programs within robotics, autonomous systems, AI, industrial automation, or related fields.
• Proven track record building and scaling new business units, programs, or operational organizations.
• Deep understanding of Physical AI, robotics, embodied intelligence, simulation environments, and AI training ecosystems.
• Experience managing executive customer relationships and strategic programs.
• Strong operational leadership experience with globally distributed teams.
• Demonstrated ability to translate emerging technologies into commercial offerings.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience at or working closely with organizations such as NVIDIA, Amazon Robotics, Tesla, Scale AI, Waymo, Figure AI, Agility Robotics, Boston Dynamics, Aurora, Innovation.
• Experience with robotics operations, humanoid robotics, autonomous systems, reinforcement learning, digital twins and simulation, teleoperations, human‑in‑the‑loop workflows, AI data operations, Physical AI safety, and validation.

Location & Compensation

Location: BayArea strongly preferred. Salary: $300k+OTE.

Equal‑Opportunity Employer

Centific is an equal‑opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, citizenship status, age, mental or physical disability, medical condition, sex (including pregnancy), gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, marital status, familial status, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements.