Software Engineer, ML Research

Title of Role: ML Research-Focused Software Engineer

Location: Mountain View, CA (In-Office)

Company Stage of Funding: Series A

Office Type: Onsite 5 Days a Week

Salary: $170K–$315K base + Equity (Exact equity based on level)

Company Description

Our client is a fast-growing venture-backed AI startup featured on the Forbes AI 50 list. In just over a year, they've established themselves as a leader in the AI developer tools space, powering intelligent code assistance across 70+ programming languages and 40+ editors. The company is built around a proprietary stack of state-of-the-art language models and high-performance inference infrastructure, delivering industry-best developer experiences.

This team is laser-focused on building impactful, revenue-generating AI products. They combine research excellence with software engineering rigor, valuing high agency, deep curiosity, and a relentless drive to ship high-quality tools that are used by hundreds of thousands of developers worldwide.

What You Will Do

Train and fine-tune cutting-edge large language models (LLMs) to support novel developer tools.

Own experimental ML research workflows from ideation through implementation, including data curation, ablation studies, and evaluation pipelines.

Prioritize experiments with high product impact and adapt quickly to emerging findings and technologies.

Collaborate with engineering and product teams to productionize research results into robust and scalable features.

Contribute to team knowledge via ML reading groups and discussions on state-of-the-art techniques and systems.

Ideal Candidate Background

2+ years of experience in software engineering, ideally at a company known for a high engineering bar.

Rapid career progression and a track record of outperforming peers.

Strong undergraduate academic performance (high GPA) from a top-tier CS program

Multiple impactful internships or research projects during undergrad.

Experience applying machine learning in production environments — especially training large-scale neural networks.

Passion for code generation, AI tooling, and the developer experience.

Preferred

Experience with large-scale training infrastructure and performance tradeoffs (e.g., H100s, TPUs, bandwidth-aware design).

Familiarity with the landscape of AI-powered developer tools like GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT, and others.

Past work in LLMs, code models, or other ML systems that directly support software engineering workflows.

Must Haves

Strong software engineering skills — research must translate into real product value.

Deep understanding of CS and ML fundamentals, from model training to systems-level performance.

Proven ability to independently design and execute high-value ML experiments.

Strong written and verbal communication skills for collaborative research and engineering work.

Compensation and Benefits

Competitive salary: $170,000 to $315,000 base, based on experience and seniority

Equity: Up to 0.15% ownership depending on level

Full health, dental, and vision insurance

Daily in-office collaboration in a vibrant Mountain View location (near Caltrain)

Mission-driven, high-ownership environment with opportunities to make outsized impact

If you're passionate about building intelligent systems, enjoy solving open-ended challenges, and want to work at the frontier of applied AI in a high-trust environment, this is the opportunity to consider.