Senior AI Research Scientist – Frontier Models

Cisco Systems, Inc; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 190,000 - 260,000; Full time

Job summary

Foundation AI, within Cisco, seeks an AI Researcher to advance frontier models and deploy enterprise-scale AI systems. You will design experiments, develop novel methods, and publish findings while translating research into practical, scalable solutions for Cisco's business priorities.

The role emphasizes training optimization, data curation at scale, and building reliable AI infrastructure, with opportunities to publish at top conferences and contribute to open-source efforts.

Qualifications

• Education/experience: Bachelors +5 yrs, Masters +3 yrs, or PhD +0 yrs in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, or related field.
• Strong experience with Python, PyTorch, production-grade software engineering, and common AI/ML libraries.
• Experience with large language models, model training, fine-tuning, evaluation, inference, and optimization.
• Strong understanding of data pipelines, model experimentation, and scalable AI system design.
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to explain complex research and engineering concepts to cross-functional partners.

Responsibilities

• Develop scalable data curation and processing methods that improve model training and task-specific performance.
• Build production-ready AI systems using strong software engineering practices.
• Optimize large language models and agentic systems for enterprise and security-focused use cases.

Skills

Python

PyTorch

Production-grade software

AI/ML libraries

Large language models

Model training

Fine-tuning

Evaluation

Inference

Optimization

Data pipelines

Model experimentation

Scalable AI systems

Communication

Tools

vLLM

NVIDIA Triton

TorchServe

Docker

Kubernetes

MLOps pipelines

AWS

GCP

Azure

Job description

Foundation AI, within Cisco, seeks an AI Researcher to advance frontier models and deploy enterprise-scale AI systems. You will design experiments, develop novel methods, and publish findings while translating research into practical, scalable solutions for Cisco's business priorities.

The role emphasizes training optimization, data curation at scale, and building reliable AI infrastructure, with opportunities to publish at top conferences and contribute to open-source efforts.