Staff ML Engineer - Large Driving Model for Autonomy

Rivian Automotive; Palo Alto (CA); On-site; USD 210,000 - 285,000; Full time

Job summary

Rivian Automotive is seeking a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to lead the Large Driving Model lifecycle for our Autonomy stack. You’ll own data curation, post-training alignment, and evaluation pipelines, guiding architectures and strategic data choices for on-road performance.

You will act as a technical authority, coordinating across perception, planning, and platform teams to ship improvements that impact daily driving safety and experience.

Qualifications

• MS or PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Robotics, or related field.
• 7+ years of industry experience on production-grade ML systems at Staff or Lead level.
• Expert-level Python and PyTorch; experience with large-scale distributed training frameworks preferred.
• Deep expertise in state-of-the-art foundation models, post-training paradigms, and autonomous driving/robotics perception, prediction, or planning.
• Proven ability to own full ML data verticals including data curation and synthetic data generation.
• Strong foundations in linear algebra, geometry, optimization, algorithms, and data structures.
• Excellent communication skills to set direction and build consensus in a fast-paced environment.

Responsibilities

• End-to-End vertical ownership of the LDM lifecycle and data curation.
• Design and optimize model architectures with robust validation and scalable systems.
• Provide technical leadership within the Autonomy department.
• Balance business, safety, and operational tradeoffs in roadmaps and timelines.
• Architect scalable ML systems and establish team best practices.
• Influence cross-functional roadmaps across perception, planning, and platform teams.
• Deploy and monitor real-world, on-road model performance in Rivian vehicles.

Skills

Python

PyTorch

Distributed training

ML systems

Data curation

Leadership

Communication

Education

MS/PhD

Tools

Distributed training frameworks

Job description

Rivian Automotive is seeking a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to lead the Large Driving Model lifecycle for our Autonomy stack. You’ll own data curation, post-training alignment, and evaluation pipelines, guiding architectures and strategic data choices for on-road performance.

You will act as a technical authority, coordinating across perception, planning, and platform teams to ship improvements that impact daily driving safety and experience.