AI Research Architect

• Bay Area (Onsite or Hybrid)
• Anywhere
• Posted 5 days ago

Location: Bay Area (Onsite or Hybrid)

About Velaura AI

Velaura AI is building the next generation of compute platforms for artificial intelligence. As AI expands beyond the cloud into edge systems and physical environments, the constraints of energy efficiency, latency, and system architecture are becoming fundamental.

A particularly exciting frontier is physical and embodied AI-systems that perceive, reason, and act in the real world. Applications such as robotics, autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), drones, and other intelligent machines demand new approaches to compute that combine real-time responsiveness, energy efficiency, and advanced AI capabilities.

Our mission is to design silicon and systems from first principles to enable these emerging classes of AI applications. Velaura combines deep semiconductor expertise with hardware-software co-design to deliver breakthrough performance per watt across cloud, edge, and embodied AI workloads.

We are assembling a small, world-class team of researchers, architects, and engineers to rethink the foundations of AI compute.

Role Overview

We are looking for an AI Research Architect who will help shape the intersection of AI model design and next-generation compute architectures.

In this role, you will study modern AI model architectures-including transformers and emerging alternatives-and analyze how their mathematical and algorithmic structure maps onto efficient hardware implementations.

You will help answer questions such as:

• Which model architectures are best suited for real-world AI systems such as robotics and drones?
• How should models evolve when compute efficiency becomes a primary constraint?
• How can model structures and algorithms be modified to better align with efficient silicon implementations?

This role sits at the boundary between AI research, algorithms, and hardware architecture, and offers the opportunity to influence both the models we run and the silicon that runs them.

Responsibilities

• Analyze modern AI model architectures-including transformers and emerging alternatives-to understand their computational structure and system requirements.
• Study the mathematical and algorithmic properties of models to identify opportunities for architectural innovation.
• Explore modifications to model structures, training approaches, or dataflows that improve efficiency on specialized hardware.
• Collaborate closely with hardware architects to translate model characteristics into efficient compute and memory architectures.
• Investigate model architectures suited for real-time and embodied AI systems, including robotics and autonomous machines.
• Develop insights into how future AI models will interact with system constraints such as latency, power, and memory bandwidth.
• Track emerging research in machine learning and identify opportunities where new model architectures may benefit from specialized hardware.

Required Qualifications

• Strong background in machine learning, deep learning, or related fields.
• Deep understanding of modern model architectures, including transformers and related approaches.
• Strong mathematical foundation in machine learning, optimization, and deep learning algorithms.
• Experience working with ML frameworks such as PyTorch, JAX, or TensorFlow.
• Ability to analyze model computation and translate it into system-level implications.
• Interest in the intersection of AI models, algorithms, and compute architecture.

Preferred Qualifications

• Research experience in machine learning or AI systems.
• Experience designing or modifying model architectures.
• Familiarity with model efficiency techniques such as quantization, sparsity, pruning, or distillation.
• Exposure to emerging model paradigms beyond transformers.
• Interest in embodied AI, robotics, or real-world AI systems.
• Experience working at the boundary between AI algorithms and hardware systems.

Why Join Velaura

You will work on some of the most fundamental questions at the intersection of AI models and compute architecture.

Rather than optimizing existing systems, you will help define the relationship between future AI model architectures and the hardware that enables them, particularly for emerging applications in robotics, drones, and embodied intelligence.

If you are excited about exploring new AI architectures and shaping the compute platforms that will run them, we would love to hear from you

Velaura is an Equal Opportunity Employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status. We also take affirmative action to offer employment opportunities to minorities, women, individuals with disabilities, and protected veterans.

Velaura is committed to working with qualified individuals with physical or mental disabilities. Applicants who would like to contact us regarding the accessibility of our website or who need special assistance or a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or hiring process may contact us at: careers@velaura.ai. This contact information is for accommodation requests only. Evaluation of requests for reasonable accommodation will be determined on a case-by-case basis.