Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver—The World's Most Experienced Driver™—to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo One, a fully autonomous ride-hailing service, and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over one million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving tens of millions of miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 13+ U.S. states.

The Driver Understanding and Evaluation (DUE) team at Waymo is developing rich metrics for understanding the behavior of the Waymo Driver in the real world. These technologies come together to evaluate the behavior of the Waymo Driver.

The DUE Machine Learning team will combine human judgements and deep learning models to deliver training and evaluation data for hundreds of metrics and components that make up the Waymo driver. We are looking for researchers and software engineers who are passionate about developing computer vision and machine learning techniques for the Evaluation systems on our autonomous vehicles, and are committed to improve the performance of our technology stack.

In this role, you will

• Report to the Director of Simulation
• Lead the development and optimization of cutting edge computer vision algorithms and machine learning models to enhance human-led triaging and introduce automation for high-volume workflows
• Develop Reinforcement Learning from industry best practices and human preference-based data collection and evaluation system
• Enhance User Feedback Analysis, collaborate with product and business teams to design and implement tools for multi-label classifications, sentiment assessment, comment summarization, root cause analysis and trend analysis of rider feedback
• Drive technical direction, and provide technical inputs and guidance to the team
• Collaborate with multiple teams (e.g., Prediction, Planning, Research, PMs, TPMs), other technical leads, and senior leaderships across Waymo to achieve important strategic efforts

At a minimum we would like you to have:

• B.S. in Computer Science, Robotics, Machine Learning, similar technical field of study, or equivalent practical experience
• Coding experience in C++ or Python.
• Experience in at least one of: Computer Vision, Foundational Models, NLP, or Robotics.
• 5+ years hands-on of experience in computer vision and machine learning projects
• Experience with ML frameworks such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, Hugging Face's transformers, along with expertise in deep learning models and ML deployment at scale
• Relocation to Bay Area #LI-Hybrid

It's preferred if you have:

• M.S. or Ph.D. degree Computer Science or related quantitative field with a specialization of machine learning
• Experience with building tools for applied machine learning, including MLOps, evaluation/validation techniques, and model performance optimization
• Large-scale data processing and analytical skills

The expected base salary range for this full-time position across US locations is listed below. Actual starting pay will be based on job-related factors, including exact work location, experience, relevant training and education, and skill level. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for the role location or, if the role can be performed remote, the specific salary range for your preferred location, during the hiring process. 

Waymo employees are also eligible to participate in Waymo’s discretionary annual bonus program, equity incentive plan, and generous Company benefits program, subject to eligibility requirements.