ML Engineer, Foundation Model Recipes

Waymo; Kirkland (WA); Hybrid; USD 175,000 - 215,000; Full time

Job summary

Waymo in Kirkland, WA is seeking aSenior Research Scientist to advance robotics and machine learning for embodied AI. You will collaborate across teams to deploy innovative technology in production and work with cutting-edge Foundation Models to push the boundaries of autonomous driving.

This hybrid role reports to a Senior Research Scientist and emphasizes data-driven model development and scalable evaluation.

Qualifications

• Masters degree or equivalent practical experience.
• Proficiency in Python.
• Familiarity with PyTorch, JAX or TensorFlow.
• Previous industrial or research ML model recipe development experience.

Responsibilities

• Develop and extend cutting-edge research in robotics and ML for advanced embodied AI.
• Collaborate across teams to land innovative tech in production.
• Work with state-of-the-art Foundation Models.
• Drive model development via data, evaluation, and systems.
• Build and extend large-scale data and evaluation pipelines.

Skills

Python

PyTorch

JAX

TensorFlow

Distributed pipelines

Education

Master's degree in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Robotics, or equivalent

Tools

Distributed data pipelines

Job description

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the world's most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver-The World’s Most Experienced Driver-to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo’s fully autonomous ride‑hail service and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over ten million rider‑only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving over 100 million miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 15+ U.S. states.

The mission of the Waymo AI Foundations team is to develop machine learning solutions addressing open problems in autonomous driving, towards the goal of safely operating Waymo vehicles in dozens of cities and under all driving conditions. As part of our work, we also initiate and foster collaborations with other research teams in Alphabet. AI Foundations areas that we are currently focusing on include reinforcement learning, learning from demonstration, generative modeling, Bayesian inference, hierarchical learning, and robust evaluation.

In this hybrid role, you will report to a Senior Research Scientist.

You will:

• Develop and extend cutting‑edge research in robotics and machine learning to advance state‑of‑the‑art recipes for advancing the quality, safety, and realism of embodied AI agents
• Partner within and across organizations to land disruptive and innovative tech in production
• Work with a variety of state‑of‑the‑art Foundation Models
• Drive model development via data, eval, and systems
• Implement and extend large large scale data and evaluation pipeline

You have:

• Masters degree in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Robotics, similar technical field of study, or equivalent practical experience
• Proficiency in Python
• Familiarity with one of the modern deep learning frameworks (e.g. Pytorch, JAX, Tensorflow)
• Prior work in an industrial or research setting developing recipes for ML models

We prefer:

• Track record of publications in top‑tier conferences or leading open source projects in the related fields
• Strong hands‑on SWE skills, able to design, implement, and extend large distributed pipelines
• Experience in AV planning and related research
• Experience in labeling and curating data for ML eval and training

The expected base salary range for this full‑time position across US locations is listed below. Actual starting pay will be based on job‑related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level.

Waymo employees are also eligible to participate in Waymo’s discretionary annual bonus program, equity incentive plan, and generous Company benefits program, subject to eligibility requirements.

Salary Range: $175,000 — $215,000 USD