Talent.com
Founding Audio AI Research Engineer
Founding Audio AI Research EngineerDavid AI • San Francisco, CA, United States
Founding Audio AI Research Engineer

Founding Audio AI Research Engineer

David AI • San Francisco, CA, United States
[job_card.30_days_ago]
[job_preview.job_type]
  • [job_card.full_time]
[job_card.job_description]

About David AI

David AI is the first audio data research company. We bring an R&D approach to data–developing datasets with the same rigor AI labs bring to models. Our mission is to bring AI into the real world, and we believe audio is the gateway. Speech is versatile, accessible, and human—it fits naturally into everyday life. As audio AI advances and new use cases emerge, high-quality training data is the bottleneck. This is where David AI comes in.

David AI was founded in 2024 by a team of former Scale AI engineers and operators. In less than a year, we’ve brought on most FAANG companies and AI labs as customers. We recently raised a $50M Series B from Meritech, NVIDIA, Jack Altman (Alt Capital), Amplify Partners, First Round Capital and other Tier 1 investors.

Our team is sharp, humble, ambitious, and tight-knit. We’re looking for the best research, engineering, product, and operations minds to join us on our mission to push the frontier of audio AI.

About our Research team

As an audio data research company, we believe model capabilities come from high quality, differentiated data. David AI’s research team performs ambitious, long-term research into audio capabilities, while working with internal and external stakeholders to productionalize the latest research insights.

About this role

As a Founding Audio AI Research Engineer , you'll define the research agenda that shapes how the world's best AI labs train their audio models. You’ll have a world‑class workforce of human AI trainers, compute resources, and independence to drive your roadmap.

In this role, you will

  • Define and build comprehensive evaluation frameworks for audio AI capabilities across speech, emotion, conversation dynamics, and acoustic patterns.
  • Research and prototype novel approaches to audio quality assessment, automated labeling, and data collection optimization.
  • Design targeted data collection pipelines for novel, high-value audio capabilities
  • Architect automated systems for continuous classifier improvement and prompt engineering evaluation.
  • Evaluate frontier models and create actionable research directions.
  • Publish findings and papers in top conferences.

Your background looks like

  • 3+ years of experience in AI / ML research or engineering, preferably with multimodal models
  • Proven ability to translate research insights into production systems and scalable solutions.
  • Experience with Python and PyTorchExperience designing and conducting rigorous ML experiments and evaluations.
  • Bonus points if you have

  • PhD or Masters in Computer Science or a related field with a focus on ML or audio / speech.
  • Published research work in top‑tier CS, AI and / or audio‑related conferences.
  • Strong record of publication in evaluations or data, particularly for audio / speech.
  • Experience in large scale data processing or high performance computing.
  • Benefits

  • Unlimited PTO.
  • Top‑notch health, dental, and vision coverage with 100% coverage for most plans.
  • FSA & HSA access.
  • 401k access.
  • Meals 2x daily through DoorDash + snacks and beverages available at the office.
  • Unlimited company‑sponsored Barry’s classes.
  • #J-18808-Ljbffr

    [job_alerts.create_a_job]

    Founding Ai Engineer • San Francisco, CA, United States

    [internal_linking.similar_jobs]
    AI Research Engineer, Enterprise Evaluations

    AI Research Engineer, Enterprise Evaluations

    Scale AI • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    AI Research Engineer, Enterprise Evaluations.Scale AI is seeking a technically rigorous and driven.This high‑impact role is critical to our mission of delivering the industry's leading.You will be ...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_30] • [promoted]
    Research Engineer, AI Discovery & Infra

    Research Engineer, AI Discovery & Infra

    Anthropic • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    A prominent AI research organization seeks a Research Engineer to work on large-scale infrastructure for AI systems.This role involves designing systems, optimizing pipelines, and enhancing perform...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    AI Research Engineer

    AI Research Engineer

    Muro AI • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Muro AI is transforming how the $2T construction industry plans and builds.Founded by Cornell alumni, ex-founders, and former McKinsey operators, we’re building AI agents that automate the most com...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Founding AI Engineer

    Founding AI Engineer

    Workweave • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Weave (YC W25) is building the definitive platform for understanding and improving how engineering teams work.We believe the way engineering output is measured today is fundamentally broken and tha...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_1_day] • [promoted]
    Founding Research Engineer - RL & AI Systems, Equity

    Founding Research Engineer - RL & AI Systems, Equity

    The LLM Data Company • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    A leading AI development firm in San Francisco is seeking an experienced professional to design and implement scalable reinforcement learning (RL) solutions. You will work on innovative training env...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Founding AI Engineer

    Founding AI Engineer

    HartleyCo • San Francisco Bay Area, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Founding AI Engineer (YC-backed Voice + Text AI Startup).Team housing available in San Francisco.Our client is a YC-backed seed-stage startup building the. Their platform is already being used by en...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Founding AI Research Scientist

    Founding AI Research Scientist

    DimRed • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    DimRed is building a platform to automate the most challenging parts of scaling AI Agents and LLM-based systems.We believe the path forward for AI systems is grounded in reliability and interpretab...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_30] • [promoted]
    Research Engineer

    Research Engineer

    Goliath Partners • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Direct message the job poster from Goliath Partners.Our client is a well-funded AI research venture leveraging cutting-edge audio and speech technologies. The founding team includes a CTO who previo...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_1_hour] • [promoted] • [new]
    Remote Research Engineer, Agentic AI Evals

    Remote Research Engineer, Agentic AI Evals

    HUD • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [filters.remote]
    [job_card.full_time]
    A technology startup in San Francisco seeks a research engineer to build evaluation environments for AI systems.The candidate should have proficiency in Python, Docker, and Linux.Experience with LL...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Founding AI Researcher for Diamond Product

    Founding AI Researcher for Diamond Product

    Menlo Ventures • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    A dynamic tech startup in San Francisco is seeking a founding AI Researcher to advance their AI product capabilities.The ideal candidate will lead research in large language models and program synt...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    AI research engineer

    AI research engineer

    Mental & Mentla • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Note - Below contains the outcomes and competencies for the team.If you bring standout strengths in some areas but not all, you are still encouraged to apply. Design, train, ship, iterate on, and in...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Research Engineer, AWS Agentic AI

    Research Engineer, AWS Agentic AI

    Amazon • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Define, design and lead the development of tools that accelerate the science experimentation and delivery process.Design and guide the science team's implementation, enabling Science proof of conce...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    AI research engineer

    AI research engineer

    Monograph • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Note - Below contains the outcomes and competencies for the team.If you bring standout strengths in some areas but not all, you are still encouraged to apply. Design, train, ship, iterate on, and in...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    AI Research Scientist

    AI Research Scientist

    HUM • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    SF or Waterloo, with ability to travel.Backed by top funds, we’ve raised $10M+ and are now heads down building.Join us at the cutting edge, where we’re scaling generative transformer diffusion mode...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Founding Research Engineer

    Founding Research Engineer

    Adam • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    This range is provided by Adam.Your actual pay will be based on your skills and experience — talk with your recruiter to learn more. We’re building the founding research team at Adam.At Adam, we’re ...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_30] • [promoted]
    AI Research Engineer, Enterprise Evaluations

    AI Research Engineer, Enterprise Evaluations

    Scale AI, Inc. • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    Scale AI is seeking a technically rigorous and driven.This high-impact role is critical to our mission of delivering the industry's leading. You will be a hands-on contributor to the core systems th...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_30] • [promoted]
    Founding Research Engineer - Frontier AI & RL Systems

    Founding Research Engineer - Frontier AI & RL Systems

    Appliedcompute • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    A tech startup specializing in AI seeks a Founding Research Engineer to train large language models and develop novel methods for agentic training. This position demands expertise in ML frameworks l...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]
    Research Engineer - Causal AI

    Research Engineer - Causal AI

    Mxv • San Francisco, CA, United States
    [job_card.full_time]
    IC4 Estimated salary commensurate with experience.IC5 Estimated salary commensurate with experience.Market-based : Our formula ensures new hires earn at or above real-time benchmarks.Ownership : Our ...[show_more]
    [last_updated.last_updated_variable_days] • [promoted]