Director, Applied AI Research - Compute & Hardware - CA, Santa Clara, United States
Originally posted 8 July 2026 by the employer. Relisted by the employer on 11 September 2026.
About the role
AMD is seeking a Director, Applied AI Research - Compute & Hardware to lead research that sits where AI, compute, and AMD hardware meet. The role focuses on applied research utilizing agents, reinforcement learning, and recursive self-improvement (RSI) across compute and hardware targets.
What you'll do
- Define and own an applied AI research agenda focused on compute and hardware, including kernel and compiler optimization, PPA and design-space exploration, and AI-for-systems. - Build, lead, and mentor a team of applied researchers and research engineers, establishing research direction and standards for rigor and delivery. - Use recursive self-improvement loops to achieve verifiable gains on concrete compute and hardware targets. - Design evaluation, simulation, and verification infrastructure, including fast verifiers and benchmarks, to validate applied research results. - Address practical failure modes of reinforcement learning and self-improving loops, including reward hacking, evaluation gaming, and reward-signal scaling. - Partner with silicon, architecture, compiler, software, and AI-for-hardware engineering teams to ground research in real problems and integrate findings into real flows.
What you'll need
- PhD in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Machine Learning, or a related field, or equivalent research experience and demonstrated impact. - Technical leadership in applied AI/ML research with a track record of research reaching real systems or production impact. - Expertise in reinforcement learning, including reward modeling, training pipelines, and practical failure modes of RL at scale. - Background in AI-for-systems and compute/hardware domains, such as kernel or compiler optimization, design-space exploration, or hardware/software co-design. - Experience building evaluation, simulation, or verification infrastructure supporting applied research and training loops. - Experience leading research teams and setting technical direction across concurrent workstreams.
Nice to have
- Ability to remain hands-on with training pipelines, kernels, or research prototyping while leading a team. - Track record of attracting, hiring, and developing applied AI research talent.
Skills: AI research, compute optimization, hardware/software co-design, reinforcement learning, PPA
This role has been open 105 days — well above the 83-day median for AI/ML Hardware Engineering roles.
AI/ML Hardware Engineering · AI ML Hardware
|
Open roles in category
511
|
Median days open
83 d
|
Median salary
$236k
|
See the full market breakdown ▾Category comparison, skills in demand, and who else is hiring
| Metric | AMD | All employers we track in this specialty (511 roles · 76 employers) |
|---|---|---|
| Open roles in this specialty | 38 | 511 |
| Open roles in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family | 406 | 6296 · 145 employers |
| Median days open | 95 d | 83 d (+12 d vs this employer) |
| Median salary (USD postings) | — | $236k |
Skills observed across this category: AI research, compute optimization, hardware/software co-design, reinforcement learning, PPA
Who's hiring in this category
- Qualcomm · 103 open roles · median 112 d
- NVIDIA · 91 open roles · median 56 d
- AMD (this employer) · 40 open roles · median 85 d
- Micron Technology · 27 open roles · median 56 d
- Analog Devices · 18 open roles · median 39 d
- Mobileye · 18 open roles · median 84 d
How we counted: 511 open AI/ML Hardware Engineering (AI ML Hardware) roles from 76 employers tracked in the SemiconductorJobs index, counted 21 Oct 2026. Specialty figures count only roles carrying this exact specialty label, so an employer's related work in neighbouring specialties is not included there — it is counted in the wider Software, Firmware & Systems family row. Figures refresh nightly.