Software Engineer - Applied AI

San Carlos, CA
Full-time
$250K - $300K
Posted Nov 12, 2026

Skills

Machine Learning
Python
Robotics
Large Language Models

Job description

ABOUT 1X

We’re building humanoid robots that work in home - doing the chores, handling the tasks, and giving people their time back. Simple, but it’s not.

To do this right, we have to solve robotics, AI, manufacturing - at the same time, at scale, in a form factor that has to be safe enough to live with your family. If you’re inspired by this, you’ll thrive here. We’ve been at this since 2014 and we’re at the point where the hard problems are behind us and the hard work is in front of us.

NEO is our flagship - a home robot designed to move, learn, and operate in the real world alongside real people. We’re not demoing it - we’re shipping it. We’re excited to meet you, if this excites you.

If you’ve spent your career working on problems that matter and want to see them actually reach the world - this is that moment. We’re scaling, we’re hiring with intention, and we need people who want to build something that will genuinely change how humans spend their time - safely creating abundance for all.

ABOUT THE TEAM

The Applied AI team turns modern AI into capabilities NEO can actually use. We take strong existing models - vision, language, audio, and our own in-house World Model - and adapt them to real problems for real customers, then prove they work on the robot. Every capability we ship is a new reason for someone to bring NEO home or into their business.

YOUR CHARTER

The mission of this role is to take a customer or product problem and deliver a working, tested AI capability on NEO - by defining the right outcome, building the right dataset, and fine-tuning the right model. You will not be designing new model architectures. You will be the person who knows exactly what data a problem needs, how to get it, whether the model is actually learning from it, and how to fix it when it is not. Early projects include models that read and act on screens, safety models that check what goes into and out of the robot's AI systems, and audio models that isolate individual speakers in noisy rooms. You will work closely with product managers, customers, and our research teams, and each problem you solve becomes a repeatable recipe for the next one.

KEY OUTCOMES

•Own each problem from request to result - partner with product managers and customers to turn an open-ended ask into a clear problem statement and a measurable definition of success before any training begins.

•Define and build the dataset each problem needs - what to collect, how to collect it on the robot or synthetically, and how to label and validate it so the data supports the outcome.

•Deliver working capabilities by fine-tuning and adapting existing models, without degrading what the base model already does well.

•Prove it works - build evaluations, test on real hardware, and debug to whatever depth the problem requires, from the data to the training run to the integration on the robot.

•Build repeatable recipes for data collection, fine-tuning, and evaluation so each new customer problem ships faster than the last.

KEY COMPETENCIES

•Data judgment - knows what data a problem actually needs, and can tell when the data is the problem.

•Diagnostic rigor - can tell whether a model is learning, find out why when it is not, and fix it at the right level.

•Robotics fluency paired with modern ML - connects model behavior to how a physical system behaves in the real world.

•Outcome ownership - driven by solving a real person's problem, and does not call something done until it has been tested and works.

•Clarity - turns ambiguity into a crisp problem statement and communicates progress and tradeoffs plainly.

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS

•Degree in Robotics, Computer Science, Electrical or Mechanical Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent industry experience.

•Proven track record of fine-tuning modern ML models and taking them through evaluation to final results - in industry, at a startup, in a research lab, an internship, or graduate work.

•Experience working with robotic systems or real hardware, including sensor data and testing on physical systems.

•Demonstrated ability to build datasets end to end - collection, cleaning, labeling, and validation.

•Strong Python and experience with a modern deep learning framework such as PyTorch.

PREFERRED SKILLS

•Experience in a customer-facing, solutions, or forward-deployed engineering role.

•Exposure to multimodal, vision-language, LLM, or speech and audio models.

•Familiarity with synthetic data generation or simulation for training data.

•Experience at an early-stage startup or a robotics research lab.

•Publications or open-source contributions in ML or robotics

WHAT DOES A SUCCESSFUL 1X TEAM MEMBER LOOK LIKE:

Team members at 1X who thrive here are builders. They move fast, own their work completely, and treat time like it’s the one thing you can’t get back - because it is. They say what they mean, finish what they start, and hold themselves to a standard before anyone has to ask. We push each other to be better, and we do it with honesty and respect.

BENEFITS

•Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage

•Generous paid time off, company holidays, and parental leave

•401(k) plan with company match (100% on the first 3% of contributions, 50% on the next 2%)

•Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA) and Health Savings Accounts (HSA) options

•Commuter benefits (transit and parking)

•Short-term and long-term disability, and life insurance

•Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for mental health, financial, and personal support

•Onsite snacks and catered lunches

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER

1X is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, marital status, medical condition, genetic information, disability, military or veteran status, justice system impact, or any other characteristic protected under applicable federal, state, or local law.