Engineering Manager, ML Performance Optimization

Zoox
Foster City, CA
Hybrid

Who this role is best for

Geared toward experienced ML performance engineers comfortable with cross-functional collaboration and infrastructure optimization, with a focus on autonomous driving and U.S.-based work arrangements.

Best fit for

  • Candidates with a proven track record in distributed training and inference optimization for large-scale models
    — “Drive end-to-end performance optimization for large-scale model training and inference”
  • Individuals who have led teams and demonstrated leadership in ML infrastructure development
    — “You will lead a team of strong ML performance engineers”
  • Professionals with a background in GPU and embedded accelerator optimization techniques
    — “profiling/benchmarking across GPU and embedded accelerators”

Things to consider

  • Compensation includes stock rights and may vary by location and seniority level
    — “Compensation will vary based on geographic location and level”
  • This role demands cross-functional partnership across multiple ML and hardware teams
    — “Collaborate closely with cross-functional teams, including ML researchers, software engineers, data engineers, and hardware engineers”

How to stand out

  • Highlight experience in model compression and low-latency inference in your resume and interviews
    — “low-latency on-vehicle inference that meets strict real-time and compute budgets”
  • Emphasize your ability to build scalable and user-friendly ML infrastructure
    — “Experience building user-friendly ML Infrastructure that enabled large-scale model training”
  • Demonstrate leadership in managing teams and driving performance improvements across departments
    — “Attract, hire, and inspire a diverse world-class engineering team”
Pace · SteadyCollaboration · HighAutonomy · MediumDecision Impact · Team

Derived from job-description analysis by Serendipath's career intelligence engine.

What success looks like

  • ML platform design
  • team leadership
Typical background
software engineeringML performance

Skills & requirements

Required

ML Performance OptimizationDistributed TrainingGPU Utilization

Preferred

AI InfrastructureTeam Management

Stack & domain

Distributed Training StrategiesMixed-precision TrainingKernel-level OptimizationCompiler StacksQuantizationProfiling/benchmarkingLeadershipCollaborationMentoringMachine LearningAutonomous Driving

About the role

Original posting from Zoox via Lever

Zoox is on a mission to reimagine transportation and build autonomous robotaxis from the ground up that are safe, reliable, clean, and enjoyable for everyone. With bidirectional driving capabilities and four-wheel steering, our vehicle allows us to maneuver through compact spaces and change directions without needing to reverse. We are at a critical inflection point as we scale our robotaxi deployment, and it is a great time to join Zoox and have a significant impact on executing our mission. 

Our growing ML performance engineering leadership team is looking for an Engineering Manager, ML Performance Optimization. The centralized ML performance team at Zoox plays a crucial role in enabling innovations across all our ML research teams to develop and deploy models across our robotaxi and cloud infrastructure and to advance cutting-edge training and inference optimization techniques.

The Opportunity

We are working on many interesting challenges to enable rapid experimentation and scale our multi-modal Foundation models and RL infrastructure, and ensure these models run efficiently on our vehicles, meeting our latency targets. You will get to work across all ML teams within Zoox - Perception, Prediction, Planner, Simulation and our Advanced Hardware Engineering group, and have the opportunity to significantly push the boundaries of ML scaling and acceleration at Zoox.

You will lead a team of strong ML performance engineers and this team has many growth opportunities as we expand our geofences at U.S markets and venture into new ML domains. If you want to learn more about our ML Infrastructure, here is one of our past talks at re:Invent.

In this role, you will::

Vision: Develop and execute a strategic vision and roadmap for ML Training and Inference Performance Optimization, ensuring scalability, reliability, and performance to support autonomous driving.

Technical acumen: Lead the design, implementation, and operation of a robust and efficient ML platform to enable the training, validation, serving, optimization and monitoring of ML models.

ML Performance Optimization: Drive end-to-end performance optimization for large-scale model training and inference, including distributed training efficiency, GPU utilization, memory and communication optimization, model compression (quantization, pruning, distillation), and low-latency on-vehicle inference that meets strict real-time and compute budgets.

Hiring: Attract, hire, and inspire a diverse world-class engineering team, fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration, and excellence.

Partnership: Collaborate closely with cross-functional teams, including ML researchers, software engineers, data engineers, and hardware engineers, to define requirements and align on architectural decisions.

Mentorship: Enable engineers on the team to grow their careers by providing the right opportunities and clear, timely feedback.

Qualifications:

8+ years of relevant experience, including 3+ years of management experience managing engineers.

Strong technical background in ML performance optimization, such as distributed training strategies (data, tensor, pipeline parallelism, FSDP/ZeRO), mixed-precision training, kernel-level optimization (CUDA, Triton), compiler stacks (torch.compile, XLA, TVM), quantization, and profiling/benchmarking across GPU and embedded accelerators.

Experience building user-friendly ML Infrastructure that enabled large-scale model training and high-throughput, low-latency serving use cases.

Experience with training frameworks like PyTorch, JAX, etc., leveraging GPUs for distributed model training.

Experience with GPU-accelerated inference using TensorRT, Ray Serve, or similar frameworks.

Proven track record of extensive cross-functional collaboration, partnering with research, product, hardware, and platform teams to align priorities, influence technical direction, and deliver measurable performance improvements across organizational boundaries.

Compensation:

Base Salary Range

There are three major components to compensation for this position: salary, Amazon Restricted Stock Units (RSUs), and Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights. A sign-on bonus may be offered as part of the compensation package. The listed range applies only to the base salary. Compensation will vary based on geographic location and level. Leveling, as well as positioning within a level, is determined by a range of factors, including, but not limited to, a candidate's relevant years of experience, domain knowledge, and interview performance. The salary range listed in this posting is representative of the range of levels Zoox is considering for this position.

Zoox also offers a comprehensive package of benefits, including paid time off (e.g. sick leave, vacation, bereavement), unpaid time off, Zoox Stock Appreciation Rights, Amazon RSUs, health insurance, long-term care insurance, long-term and short-term disability insurance, and life insurance.

About Zoox

Zoox is developing the first ground-up, fully autonomous vehicle fleet and the supporting ecosystem required to bring this technology to market. Sitting at the intersection of robotics, machine learning, and design, Zoox aims to provide the next generation of mobility-as-a-service in urban environments. We’re looking for top talent that shares our passion and wants to be part of a fast-moving and highly execution-oriented team.

Follow us on LinkedIn

Accommodations

If you need an accommodation to participate in the application or interview process please reach out to accommodations@zoox.com or your assigned recruiter.

A Final Note:

You do not need to match every listed expectation to apply for this position. Here at Zoox, we know that diverse perspectives foster the innovation we need to be successful, and we are committed to building a team that encompasses a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and skills.

Source: Zoox careers (Lever)

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