Perplexity is seeking an exceptional AI Research Tech Lead to drive our research strategy and lead the development of our in-house Online LLMs, the Sonar models. In this leadership role, you will set the macro research direction across different modalities, mentor a team of researchers, and take advantage of our rich query/answer dataset to continue scaling our Sonar model performance and deliver the SOTA Online LLM experience to our users.
What you'll do
- Define and execute the macro research direction across multiple modalities, including post-training LLMs for agent trajectories and future mid-training initiatives
- Lead strategic research planning and roadmap development to advance Sonar model capabilities
- Drive innovation in supervised and reinforcement learning techniques for query answering
- Collaborate with leadership to align research priorities with product and business objectives
What you need
- Minimum of 5 years of experience working on relevant AI/ML projects with 3+ years in a technical leadership role
- Proven track record of leading and mentoring technical and research teams
- A Computer Science graduate degree at a premier academic institution
- Deep expertise with large-scale LLMs and Deep Learning systems
- Strong programming skills with versatility across multiple languages and frameworks
- Demonstrated ability to set technical vision and drive execution
- Experience with pre-training and post-training techniques (self-supervised learning along with SFT/DPO/GRPO/PPO)
- Self-starter with exceptional ownership mentality and ability to work in ambiguous environments
- Passion for solving challenging problems and pushing the boundaries of AI research
