Staff Research Scientist - VLM / VLA

General Motors LLC; Sunnyvale (CA); Hybrid; USD 219,000 - 335,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, vision

Health Savings Account

Retirement savings plan

GM vehicle discounts

Relocation benefits

Paid vacation & holidays

Job summary

General Motors is seeking a Staff Research Scientist specializing in Vision-Language Models to push the frontier of autonomous driving. You will design, train, and optimize multimodal models and deploy them on onboard vehicle hardware, enabling real-time understanding and decision making.

You will mentor engineers, collaborate across perception, planning and software teams, publish research at top conferences, and contribute to scalable, safe autonomous driving technologies for GM's global

Qualifications

• PhD required in a relevant technical field (AI/ML, robotics, CS or EE).
• 5+ years of AI/ML research and applied development experience.
• Deep expertise in modern ML architectures (transformers, multimodal systems).
• Strong programming skills in Python.
• Excellent communication, collaboration, and mentoring abilities with ability to influence ML strategy.

Responsibilities

• Research, design, and prototype Vision-Language Models and Vision-Language-Action models for real-time autonomous driving.
• Lead onboard model optimization, including quantization, pruning, distillation, and compilation for low-latency edge hardware.
• Advance multimodal alignment; integrate camera/radar/LiDAR and prompts into unified architectures.
• Shape technical roadmaps and ML priorities aligned with safety and product milestones.
• Mentor a multidisciplinary team of ML engineers, software developers, and hardware specialists.
• Collaborate with perception, planning, and infrastructure teams to integrate models into the autonomous stack.
• Represent GM at top AI conferences; publish research and pursue patents.

Skills

AI/ML research

Transformers

Python

Communication

Mentoring

Education

PhD in Machine Learning, Robotics, Computer Science, or Electrical Engineering

Job description

Job Description At General Motors, our product teams are redefining mobility. Through a human-centered design process, we create vehicles and experiences that are designed not just to be seen, but to be felt. We are turning today's impossible into tomorrow's standard -from breakthrough hardware and battery systems to intuitive design, intelligent software, and next-generation safety and entertainment features. Every day, our products move millions of people as we aim to make driving safer, smarter, and more connected, shaping the future of transportation on a global scale.

The Role

Are you ready to redefine mobility and shape the future of autonomous transportation? As a Staff Research Scientist specializing in Vision-Language Models (VLMs), Vision-Language-Action models (VLAs), and Onboard Foundational Models, you will advance the frontier of artificial intelligence to solve the most challenging problems in autonomous driving. In this role, you will bridge the gap between large-scale multimodal foundational AI and real-time physical systems. You will lead the design, training, and optimization of state-of-the-art models that allow vehicles to deeply understand complex visual scenes, reason through open-ended scenarios, and translate multimodal inputs directly into safe, actionable driving decisions. Crucially, your work will focus not just on cloud-scale intelligence, but on pioneering the techniques required to compress, quantize, and deploy these massive architectures directly onto resource-constrained onboard vehicle hardware. You will help shape strategic technical directions, mentor a world-class team of engineers, and represent our organization at top global artificial intelligence conferences.

What You’ll Do

• Research, design, and prototype advanced Vision-Language Models and Vision-Language-Action foundational models tailored for real-time semantic understanding and behavioral prediction in autonomous driving.
• Drive the technical strategy for onboard model optimization, leading initiatives in model quantization, pruning, knowledge distillation, and compilation to ensure high-parameter models execute with ultra-low latency on vehicle edge hardware.
• Advance multimodal alignment techniques, ensuring seamless integration of camera, radar, LiDAR, and textual/logical prompts into unified foundational architectures.
• Influence technical roadmaps and shape strategic machine learning priorities that align with safety requirements, core product milestones, and next-generation vehicle launches.
• Provide technical mentorship and long-term vision to a multidisciplinary group of machine learning engineers, software developers, and hardware specialists.
• Foster internal innovation by collaborating closely with perception, planning, and infrastructure teams to integrate foundational models into the core autonomous software stack.
• Represent the company externally to the global scientific community by publishing original research, securing patents, and presenting at top-tier artificial intelligence and robotics conferences.

Your Skills & Abilities (Required Qualifications)

Ph.D. in Machine Learning, Robotics, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or a related technical field.

• 5+ years of experience in AI/ML research and applied development.
• Deep expertise in modern ML architectures (transformers, generative AI, multimodal systems).
• Strong programming skills in Python.
• Excellent communication, collaboration, and mentoring abilities, comfortable influencing technical strategy and guiding ML excellence across the organization.

What Will Give You A Competitive Edge (Preferred Qualifications)

• Demonstrated research impact in AI/ML technologies either through important publications in top conferences or demonstrated contribution to industry leading systems.
• AV/ADAS experience.

Remote

This role is based remotely but if you live within a 50-mile radius of Mountain View, you are expected to report to that location three times a week, at minimum.

Compensation

Compensation : The compensation information is a good faith estimate only. It is based on what a successful applicant might be paid in accordance with applicable state laws. The compensation may not be representative for positions located outside of New York, Colorado, California, or Washington. The salary range for this role is $218,800.00 to $335,300.00. The actual base salary a successful candidate will be offered within this range will vary based on factors relevant to the position.

Bonus Potential: An incentive pay program offers payouts based on company performance, job level, and individual performance.

• Benefits include medical, dental, vision, Health Savings Account, Flexible Spending Accounts, retirement savings plan, sickness and accident benefits, life insurance, paid vacation & holidays, tuition assistance programs, employee assistance program, GM vehicle discounts and more.

This job may be eligible for relocation benefits.

Company Vehicle

Upon successful completion of a motor vehicle report review, you will be eligible to participate in a company vehicle evaluation program, through which you will be assigned a General Motors vehicle to drive and evaluate. Program participants are required to purchase/lease a qualifying GM vehicle every four years unless one of a limited number of exceptions applies.

About GM

Our vision is a world with Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions and Zero Congestion and we embrace the responsibility to lead the change that will make our world better, safer and more equitable for all.

Why Join Us

We believe we all must make a choice every day – individually and collectively – to drive meaningful change through our words, our deeds and our culture. Every day, we want every employee to feel they belong to one General Motors team.

Benefits Overview

From day one, we’re looking out for your well-being–at work and at home–so you can focus on realizing your ambitions. Learn how GM supports a rewarding career that rewards you personally

Non-Discrimination and Equal Employment Opportunities (U.S.)

General Motors is committed to being a workplace that is not only free of unlawful discrimination, but one that genuinely fosters inclusion and belonging. We strongly believe that providing an inclusive workplace creates an environment in which our employees can thrive and develop better products for our customers. All employment decisions are made on a non-discriminatory basis without regard to sex, race, color, national origin, citizenship status, religion, age, disability, pregnancy or maternity status, sexual orientation, gender identity, status as a veteran or protected veteran, or any other similarly protected status in accordance with federal, state and local laws.

Accommodations

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We are leading the change to make our world better, safer and more equitable for all through our actions and how we behave.

Our Company Our Culture How we hire

Our diverse team of employees bring their collective passion for engineering, technology and design to deliver on our vision of a world with Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions and Zero Congestion. We are looking for adventure‑seekers and imaginative thought leaders to help us transform mobility. Explore our global locations. We are determined to lead change for the world through technology, ingenuity and harnessing the creativity of our diverse team.