Technical Lead, Multimodal Transformers

Kodiak; Mountain View (CA); On-site; USD 200,000 - 260,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation package including equity and bonuses

Medical, Dental, and Vision plans

Flexible PTO and generous parental leave

Office perks (dog-friendly, catered lunch, stocked kitchen, EV charging)

Wellbeing Benefits (gym discounts, mental health resources)

Job summary

Kodiak Robotics, Inc. in Mountain View, CA is seeking candidates for a role focused on developing multimodal transformer architectures that integrate diverse sensor technologies. With a commitment to autonomous ground transportation, Kodiak offers a competitive compensation package including equity, flexible PTO, and comprehensive health plans.

Applicants should have experience with transformer architectures and a strong understanding of scalable training for large models, reflecting their passion for utilizing AI to operate safely in real-world conditions.

Qualifications

• 4+ years experience with transformer architectures, particularly in multimodal or multi-stream settings.
• Familiarity with cross-attention, token fusion, or modality alignment techniques.
• Strong understanding of scalable training for large models.

Responsibilities

• Design and develop multimodal transformer architectures that fuse camera, LiDAR, and radar.
• Research and implement cross-modal attention mechanisms and token fusion strategies.
• Build scalable training pipelines for multimodal transformers across massive datasets.

Skills

Transformer architectures

Multimodal settings

Deep learning frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow)

Python proficiency

Distributed training

Mixed-precision optimization

Education

BS, MS, or PhD in AI, Computer Science, or related field

Job description

Kodiak Robotics, Inc. was founded in 2018 and has become a leader in autonomous ground transportation committed to a safer and more efficient future for all. The company has developed an artificial intelligence (AI) powered technology stack purpose‑built for commercial trucking and the public sector. Kodiak delivers freight daily for its customers across the southern United States using its autonomous technology. In 2024, Kodiak became the first known company to publicly announce delivering a driverless semi‑truck to a customer. Kodiak is also leveraging its commercial self‑driving software to develop, test and deploy autonomous capabilities for the U.S. Department of Defense.

Overview

Kodiak's autonomy stack is built on AI that fuses diverse sensor streams into a unified, actionable understanding of the world. We are developing GigaFusionNet – a large‑scale multimodal transformer that learns rich, joint representations across camera, LiDAR, and radar through attention‑based fusion. This role is open to all levels – from those eager to contribute to cutting‑edge research to experts driving innovation at scale.

Responsibilities

• Design and develop multimodal transformer architectures that fuse camera, LiDAR, and radar into unified representations
• Research and implement cross‑modal attention mechanisms, token fusion strategies, and efficient multi‑stream tokenization
• Build scalable training pipelines for large‑scale multimodal transformers across massive real‑world datasets
• Explore self‑supervised and contrastive pretraining objectives that learn transferable multimodal representations
• Optimize transformer models for real‑time inference under latency and compute constraints

Qualifications

• BS, MS, or PhD in AI, Computer Science, or a related field
• 4+ years experience with transformer architectures, particularly in multimodal or multi‑stream settings
• Familiarity with cross‑attention, token fusion, or modality alignment techniques
• Proficiency in Python and deep learning frameworks like PyTorch or TensorFlow
• Strong understanding of scalable training for large models, including distributed training and mixed‑precision optimization
• Passion for building AI that reasons over the full breadth of sensory input to operate safely in the real world

Benefits

• Competitive compensation package including equity and annual bonuses
• Excellent Medical, Dental, and Vision plans through Kaiser Permanente, Cigna, and MetLife (including a medical plan with infertility benefits)
• MetLife Legal Services, Identity & Fraud Protection, Hospital Indemnity Insurance, Accident Insurance, & Critical Illness Insurance
• Flexible PTO, 10 paid holidays, and generous parental leave policies
• Our office is centrally located in Mountain View, CA
• Office perks: dog‑friendly, free catered lunch, a fully stocked kitchen, and free EV charging
• Long Term Disability, Short Term Disability, Life Insurance
• Wellbeing Benefits – Headspace through Cigna, Calm through Kaiser, One Medical, Gympass, Spring Health through Cigna, Rula (mental health navigation)
• Fidelity 401(k)
• Commuter, FSA, Dependent Care FSA, HSA
• Various incentive programs (referral bonuses, patent bonuses, etc.)

Compensation

The pay range for this position in the SF/Silicon Valley location is $200,000 – $260,000 USD. Actual starting pay will be based on job‑related factors including work location, experience, relevant training, education, skill level and performance during interview. Total compensation at Kodiak includes base pay, equity, bonus, and a competitive benefits package.

Equal Opportunity Employment

At Kodiak, we strive to build a diverse community working toward our common company goals in a safe and collaborative environment where harassment of any kind is strictly prohibited. Kodiak is committed to equal opportunity employment regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability, or veteran status, or any other basis protected by applicable law.