Senior AI Research Engineer

Standard Bots; New York (NY); On-site; USD 225,000 - 250,000; Full time

Job summary

Standard Bots is seeking a Senior AI Research Engineer to design and optimize AI models and training systems for robotics. You will work with a small AI team to push the frontier of ML in autonomous platforms while enabling rapid experimentation and deployment.

Ideal candidates have 5+ years in AI modeling (or PhD with 3+ years) in self-driving or robotics, with PyTorch and Python proficiency, and experience in diffusion/AR models, RL, and scalable pipelines.

Qualifications

• Have 5+ years of AI modeling experience, specifically within the self-driving car industry (or PhD with 3+ years of AI modeling experience in the self-driving car industry).
• Proven track record developing and deploying large-scale ML models.
• Experience with diffusion and autoregressive models in a professional setting.
• Familiar with training inference and infra pipelines from camera input to trajectory output in robotics.
• Experience with RL (reinforcement learning).
• Strong understanding of modern ML architectures and training techniques.
• Experience with model debugging, optimization, and performance tuning.
• Background implementing ML research papers and adapting academic work.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement state of the art ML models and training pipelines.
• Apply novel ML techniques to robotics applications.
• Develop efficient data and training strategies.
• Implement model evaluation frameworks and metrics tracking.
• Lead model development and iteration with rapid experimentation.
• Optimize performance and debug models.
• Apply transfer learning and fine-tuning strategies.
• Build robust evaluation and debugging systems.
• Collaborate with engineering to optimize training infrastructure and deployment.

Skills

PyTorch

Python

NodeJS/Typescript

Model debugging

ML basics

Education

PhD in AI/ML or related field

Tools

Docker

Job description

Propel human productivity through the world’s most accessible robots.

People don't work at Standard Bots to make robots. They work here to make tomorrow easier. It’s fascinating, rewarding, and most of all, incredibly difficult to do. That’s why we’re searching for people who are up for the challenge. Who are optimistic about the future.

Our team comes from pioneering companies:

Our Investors

Live demos from the floor — each one built on the skills above.

About Standard Bots

At Standard Bots, we're revolutionizing real-world automation by making robotic systems accessible to everyone. Our AI-powered platform enables robots to tackle unprecedented challenges through an intuitive instruction interface, bringing the power of software automation to physical spaces.

About the Role

We're seeking a Senior AI Research Engineer to develop and optimize our AI models and training systems. This is an exciting opportunity to apply your deep ML expertise to cutting-edge AI/robotics applications. You'll work closely with our engineering team to design, implement, and iterate on large-scale AI models while building efficient systems for rapid experimentation and deployment. We have a small team of AI engineers, so we’re looking for someone who is excited to work at a startup, and work across the stack to do what is needed to get a model that achieves a customer problem.

We're looking for an experienced engineer ready to make a tangible impact in the AI robotics revolution. This role requires a proven background working on ML planning within the autonomous vehicle space with experience using the latest techniques in diffusion and autoregressive models in a professional setting. If you're excited about building the latest advancements in AI and working in the robotics space, we’d love to hear from you.

In this role, you will:

Design and implement state of the art ML models and training pipelines:

Apply novel machine learning techniques to wide range of robotics applications

Develop efficient data and training strategies

Implement model evaluation frameworks and metrics tracking

Lead model development and iteration with focus on:

Rapid experimentation and prototyping of new model architectures

Performance optimization and model debugging

Transfer learning and fine-tuning strategies

Build robust evaluation and debugging systems to:

Analyze model behavior and failure modes

Implement interpretability tools and visualization frameworks

Track and improve model metrics

Collaborate with engineering team to optimize training infrastructure and deployment

You might thrive in this role if you:

Have 5+ years of AI modeling experience, specifically within the self-driving car industry (or PhD with 3+ years of AI modeling experience in the self-driving car industry)

Proven track record developing and deploying large-scale ML models

Have experience using the latest techniques in diffusion and autoregressive models in a professional setting

Are familiar with training inference and infra pipelines that go from camera input to trajectory output for self driving or robotics

Have experience with RL (reinforcement learning)

Have a strong understanding of modern ML architectures and training techniques

Have experience with model debugging, optimization, and performance tuning

Have a background in implementing ML research papers and adapting academic work

PyTorch (experience with PyTorch required)

Python

NodeJS/Typescript

Docker

Compensation and Benefits:

The salary range for this role is $225,000 to $250,000 depending on experience. We are open to a variety of seniority levels for this role and will build compensation packages that are commensurate with seniority and skill level. Base salary is just one part of the overall compensation at Standard Bots. All Full-Time Employees are eligible for Employee Stock Options. We also offer a package of benefits including paid time off, medical/dental/vision insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, and 401(k) to regular full-time employees.

Compensation Range: $225K - $250K

Standard Bots

Team,

As you know, our goals are clear, even if the work to get there isn’t:

• Make the highest value robot hardware that’s at the Pareto front in terms of price and usability. Make it easy to use without making it expensive — this combination is key.
• Build the best API and environment for building apps on a robot. By empowering developers, we hope to help them imagine use cases that were never considered.
• Implement and contribute to the latest in robotics. We’re already making strides in areas like depth data from multi camera arrays and deep-learning-based policies for updating motion plans in realtime. There’s so much more we intend to push forward with others; a rising tide lifts all robotically assembled boats.

This is just a reminder; I realize you all know this quite well. Who knows, maybe we’ll screenshot this note and put it on our website so candidates can be as excited as we are.

CEO

Our mission

At Standard Bots, we're taking a similar approach. We're designing better hardware and easier-to-use software together to once again accelerate what humans are capable of achieving — this time, with robots. The amount of work to get there is immense, but so is the opportunity.