Senior ML Engineer, Space Optics & Vision AI

Rocket Lab USA; Long Beach (CA); On-site; USD 130,000 - 229,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Employee Stock Purchase Program

Top-tier medical plans

Dental and vision coverage

Paid vacation and sick time

11 paid holidays

401(k) with company match

Job summary

Rocket Lab USA seeks a Senior Machine Learning Engineer II for its Optical Systems division in Long Beach, CA. You will build deep learning models for EO/IR image processing, design robust ML pipelines, and work across AI/vision teams to advance space systems.

Ideal candidates have 8+ years in ML, strong Python and DL toolkit experience, and a solid math background. The role includes security clearances and proximity to cutting-edge hardware workloads.

Qualifications

• Strong background in machine learning including model selection, architecting, training, validation, testing, and deployment.
• Experience building deep learning neural nets for computer vision, image processing, or video analysis (detection, segmentation, tracking).
• Proficiency in Python and deep learning libraries (Keras, TensorFlow, PyTorch).
• Software fundamentals: version control, testing, CI/CD, containerization.

Responsibilities

• Design, train, and deploy ML models for Optical Systems applications.
• Build and maintain ML pipelines for data ingestion, feature engineering, training, and inference.
• Collaborate with researchers/engineers on AI, ML, and computer vision.
• Prototype rapidly and integrate into operational systems.
• Troubleshoot and maintain existing and new systems.
• Stay current with ML research and evaluate tools and frameworks.

Skills

Machine learning

Python

Deep learning

Computer vision

CI/CD

Containerization

Model deployment

Mathematics

Education

Bachelor's degree + 8+ years experience

Master's or PhD in CS/EE/ME/Physics

Tools

Keras

TensorFlow

PyTorch

Docker

Job description

Rocket Lab USA seeks a Senior Machine Learning Engineer II for its Optical Systems division in Long Beach, CA. You will build deep learning models for EO/IR image processing, design robust ML pipelines, and work across AI/vision teams to advance space systems.

Ideal candidates have 8+ years in ML, strong Python and DL toolkit experience, and a solid math background. The role includes security clearances and proximity to cutting-edge hardware workloads.