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About P-1 AI:

We are building an engineering AGI. We founded P-1 AI with the conviction that the greatest impact of artificial intelligence will be on the built world. Our first product is Archie, an AI engineer capable of quantitative intuition over physical product domains and engineering tool use. Archie initially performs at the level of an entry-level mechanical and electrical engineer, but rapidly gets smarter and more capable. We aim to put an Archie on every engineering team at every industrial company on earth.

Our founding team includes the top minds in deep learning, model-based engineering, and from the very industries that are our customers. We closed a $23 million seed round led by Radical Ventures that also included a number of AI luminaries (from OpenAI, DeepMind, etc.).

About the role:
We believe the magic happens at the intersection of advanced research and an ambitious product application. Your job will be to build and drive a pragmatic agenda of applied research to enable AI capabilities in multiphysics reasoning, spatial reasoning, complex tool use, continual learning, and long-horizon agentic execution that are substantially beyond the current state of the art. You will lead and grow a team of AI researchers who are world experts in each of these areas. You must be a high-agency visionary leader who motivates the team to make bold bets and execute with alacrity. This role requires significant in-person presence in our San Mateo, Calif. office where most of the AI team is based today. We will support relocation for candidates interested in moving to the Bay Area.

What you’ll do:

• Work directly with the CEO to develop and then drive the execution of the AI research agenda.

• Attract, recruit, and retain world-class AI research talent to grow the team.

• Roll up your sleeves and execute some of the AI research agenda as an individual contributor.

• Nurture connections with the greater AI ecosystem by representing the company at conferences, in publications, and through work with researchers in academia and research institutions.

• Manage the company’s model training compute resources.

• Stand up an applied AI research capability within the P-1 Defense subsidiary focused on aerospace and defense customers.

About you:

• Accomplished AI researcher on the frontier of modern AI, including, for instance, pre-/mid-/post-training large multi-modal models, world models, reinforcement learning, etc. with a track record of projects and publications.

• Clear and cogent philosophy of how to conduct AI research in the current technological epoch.

• Successful track record of leadership and management of small to medium teams of researchers and engineers in a startup, lab, corporate, or academic setting.

• Strong demonstrated interest in AI for the physical world.

• Experience and/or thirst to work in a dynamic startup environment.

• Eligible for a security clearance (prior clearance is a plus).

• Comfortable with a significant in-person presence in our San Mateo, Calif. office.

Our values:

Mission obsession & urgency: We are obsessed with building engineering AGI as quickly as possible. We also recognize that as a startup, speed is our most precious competitive advantage. We are constantly asking ourselves what we can do to go faster. We make tradeoffs and sacrifices (personally and in the workplace) in exchange for speed.

Intellectual excellence & curiosity: We ask “what if?” and experiment liberally. We always look for better ways of doing something. We read voraciously. We challenge each other to be better. We surround ourselves with A players and we actively and unapologetically reject B players (and even B+ players⸺because they tend to surround themselves with C players).

Shipping discipline: We treat production with respect. We test and demo our product constantly. We listen attentively to our customers, users, and stakeholders, and we respect our commitments to them. We also respect our commitments to each other and will go the extra mile (or ten or one hundred) to honor them.

Ownership: We all have significant ownership stakes in the company and operate in founder mode. We believe in hierarchical requirements but not in hierarchical information flows. If we see that something is broken or can be done better, we flag it and we fix it. We encourage each other to play with and fix anything and everything... but there’s a clear owner for everything.

Compensation & benefits:

This role includes a significant equity component. We are an early-stage startup, so we favor equity over cash in our current compensation philosophy. Our benefits include healthcare, dental, and vision insurance, 401k with employer matching, and unlimited PTO.