AI Researcher PhD (Full Time) United States
Cisco is building the Frontier AI Research Lab to advance frontier AI research and translate it into purpose-built models and systems. The AI Researcher will work on developing agentic models and autonomous systems, focusing on research spanning the full model lifecycle and security applications.
Responsibilities
- Collaborate with researchers, engineers, and cross-functional partners across data, platform, security, evaluation, and deployment teams
- Work at the forefront of building agentic models and autonomous systems
- Advance frontier AI research by augmenting frontier models with purpose-built internal models and open-source models
- Investigate new architectures, new training approaches, optimization methods, and interpretability techniques
- Turn research insight into reliable systems through rigorous experimentation, measurement, and collaboration
Skills
- Recent graduate or in your final year of studies toward a PhD in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, or a related field
- Understanding of LLM infrastructure, training, inference, and optimization, validated by technical interview responses, project documentation, or relevant publications
- Hands-on experience with model building, AI/LLM research, and experimentation, demonstrated through portfolio work, code samples, technical assessments, or documented academic or professional projects
- Experience working with inference engines (e.g., vLLM, Triton, TorchServe)
- Knowledge of GPU architecture and optimization
- Familiarity with agent frameworks
- Exposure to cloud native solutions and platforms
- Experience with cybersecurity principles and Python programming, including common AI libraries
- Familiarity with distributed systems and asynchronous programming models
Benefits
- Medical, dental and vision insurance
- A 401(k) plan with a Cisco matching contribution
- Paid parental leave
- Short and long-term disability coverage
- Basic life insurance
- Employees may be eligible to receive grants of Cisco restricted stock units, which vest following continued employment with Cisco for defined periods of time
- 10 paid holidays per full calendar year, plus 1 floating holiday for non-exempt employees
- 1 paid day off for employee’s birthday, paid year-end holiday shutdown, and 4 paid days off for personal wellness determined by Cisco
- Non-exempt employees** receive 16 days of paid vacation time per full calendar year, accrued at rate of 4.92 hours per pay period for full-time employees
- Exempt employees participate in Cisco’s flexible vacation time off program, which has no defined limit on how much vacation time eligible employees may use (subject to availability and some business limitations)
- 80 hours of sick time off provided on hire date and each January 1st thereafter, and up to 80 hours of unused sick time carried forward from one calendar year to the next
- Additional paid time away may be requested to deal with critical or emergency issues for family members
- Optional 10 paid days per full calendar year to volunteer
- For non-sales roles, employees are also eligible to earn annual bonuses subject to Cisco’s policies
- Employees on sales plans earn performance-based incentive pay on top of their base salary, which is split between quota and non-quota components, subject to the applicable Cisco plan
Company Overview
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