Research Lead

Responsibilities

• Research Strategy: Aligns research initiatives with the company's strategic goals and market demands. You’ll identify specific areas within autonomous control systems where DeepRL research can be effectively applied to solve real-world challenges and lead the team to accomplish those pursuits.
• Technical Leadership: Provide expert guidance and technical leadership to a team of world-class researchers, machine learning experts, and engineers. Collaborate with cross-functional teams to ensure the alignment of research goals with practical applications.
• Problem Definition: Define research problems that are not only theoretically interesting but also relevant to real-world challenges. You’ll work with stakeholders to identify specific problems that can benefit from DeepRL solutions, ensuring that the research is impactful and practical.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Collaborate closely with the engineering, product development, customer success, and business teams. You’ll work with these teams to understand practical constraints, technical requirements, and business objectives — ensuring that research efforts are directed towards creating tangible solutions.
• Product Integration: Ensure that research outcomes are seamlessly integrated into the company's products and services. You’ll collaborate with product managers, engineers and domain experts to guide the implementation of research findings into the product — ensuring that the technology is scalable, efficient, and functional.
• Innovation and Experimentation: Foster a culture of innovation and experimentation within the research team. Encourage the exploration of new approaches, methodologies, and technologies to enhance the capabilities of autonomous control systems.
• Publication and Thought Leadership: Drive the creation of impactful research contributions leading to publications in prestigious conferences and journals. Establish Phaidra as thought leaders at the intersection of DeepRL and autonomous control systems.
• Intellectual Property: Identify opportunities for intellectual property creation and patenting stemming from research endeavours.
• Budget Management: Manage research budgets effectively — allocating resources to projects that align with strategic objectives.
• People Management: Manage and mentor direct reports and sub-teams effectively, utilizing Phaidra's company values.

Key Qualifications

• Ph.D. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Robotics, or a related field. Strong academic background with a proven track record of impactful research in Deep Reinforcement Learning is required.
• Extensive Applied Research experience in an industry setting, with a track record of translating DeepRL research into impact in products.
• Proven track record of leading research efforts in an industrial setting
• Demonstrated expertise in Deep Reinforcement Learning techniques, particularly in the context of autonomous control systems.
• Proficiency in machine learning frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch) and programming languages (e.g., Python, C++).
• Excellent communication skills, including the ability to communicate complex technical concepts to diverse audiences.
• Proven ability to drive strategic initiatives, think creatively, and innovate in a fast-paced environment.
• Strong collaboration skills and the ability to foster cross-functional partnerships.
• Passion for advancing AI-driven autonomy and a commitment to ethical and responsible AI research.
• Share our company values: Transparency, Collaboration, Operational Excellence, Ownership and Empathy.