Founding Robotics ML Research Engineer

Founding Robotics ML Research Engineer

Location: [Redacted]
Company: Venture-backed Robotics Startup (YC-backed)

About the Company

A fast-growing, venture-backed robotics company is building the next generation of autonomous systems designed to monitor and maintain critical digital infrastructure.

Founded by engineers from top robotics institutions and industry-leading organizations, the team brings deep expertise across defense, logistics, agriculture, and industrial inspection.

Their mission is to deploy intelligent, dependable robotic systems into real-world environments that underpin the global digital economy.

The Role

As a Founding Robotics ML Research Engineer, you’ll operate at the intersection of cutting-edge research and real-world deployment. This is a highly hands-on role focused on taking state-of-the-art machine learning approaches and turning them into robust, production-ready robotic systems.

You’ll play a key role in shaping both the technical direction and the engineering culture of the company.

What You’ll Do

• Develop and deploy learning-based policies (e.g. behavior cloning, reinforcement learning) for complex robotic manipulation tasks

• Build and scale infrastructure for data collection, model training, and real-time system operation

• Translate advanced robotics and ML research into practical, high-performance systems deployed in real environments

• Work across the full stack, from model development through to on-robot execution

• Collaborate closely with a small, high-caliber team in a fast-paced, experimental environment

What We’re Looking For

• Background in Robotics, Computer Science, Machine Learning, or related field (MS/PhD preferred)

• Experience with modern ML approaches for robotics (e.g. diffusion policies, vision-language-action models)

• Proven experience deploying ML-based perception or control systems on physical robots

• Strong understanding of robotics fundamentals including manipulation, control, and motion planning

• Experience with standard ML tooling, frameworks, and workflows

• Comfortable operating in early-stage environments with high ownership and ambiguity

Nice to Have

• Publications in top-tier conferences (e.g. robotics, ML, or computer vision)

• Experience with embedded AI or edge deployment

• Background in real-world robot deployment in industrial environments

• Familiarity with teleoperation systems or human-in-the-loop training

• Contributions to open-source robotics or ML projects

• Exposure to tactile sensing or advanced manipulation systems

Why Join

• Founding-level impact with ownership over both technical direction and culture

• Opportunity to work on real-world robotics problems with immediate deployment

• No legacy systems, minimal bureaucracy, high autonomy

• Build systems that directly impact critical global infrastructure

Additional Info

We’re looking for exceptional builders, not checklist candidates. If you thrive in fast-moving environments and care about turning research into reality, this is the kind of team where you’ll do your best work.