Lead Ai Research Engineer, Embodied Systems
Roboforce
Milpitas
- Lead and own, from the engineering side, the embodied systems that power RoboForce's data flywheel — the onboard AI (inference) system, the data collection system, the teleoperation systems and the on-robot reinforcement learning system.
- Set the technical direction and architecture for how learned models run, are evaluated, and improve on real robots.
- Deliver these systems end-to-end on physical robots — from bring-up through reliable, real-time operation in demanding industrial environments.
- Own on-robot deployment and closed-loop evaluation of policies, turning real-world performance into measurable improvements.
- Partner with and influence the robotics software team and the ML research team to align interfaces and priorities across the stack.
- Grow the direction — mentor engineers and raise the technical bar for embodied systems work.
- Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Robotics, Electrical Engineering, or related field with significant relevant experience, or a PhD degree.
- Track record of leading complex robotic or embodied systems end-to-end and setting technical direction for other engineers.
- Strong proficiency in both C++ and Python, with solid systems programming and real-time / performance-critical engineering skills.
- Hands-on experience with ROS/ROS2 and robot middleware, including real-time integration of sensing, control, and compute.
- Experience integrating and deploying ML models/policies into real-time robotic or autonomous systems — system ownership and building, rather than model training or research.
- Requires 5 days/week in-office collaboration with the teams.
- Experience with teleoperation and data-collection systems (e.g., VR, UR, GELLO, UMI) and the challenges of collecting high-quality robot data at scale.
- Experience with on-robot reinforcement learning or closed-loop policy-improvement systems.
- Familiarity with robot learning policies (VLA, imitation learning, behavior cloning) and their real-time inference and control-integration characteristics.
- Familiarity with manipulation stacks, whole-body control interfaces, or real-time middleware tuning.
- Competitive stock options/equity programs.
- Health, dental, and vision insurance, 401(k) plan.
- Visa sponsorship and green card support for qualified candidates.
- Lunches and dinners, a fully stocked kitchen, and regular team-building events.
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