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Staff Technical Lead Manager, ML Sensor Validation

Mountain View, California, United States Full-Time Software Engineering 3591

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Staff Technical Lead Manager, ML Sensor Validation

  • 3591
  • On Site
  • Mountain View, California
  • Software Engineering
  • Full-Time
  • Advanced Career
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Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the world's 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’s fully autonomous ride-hail service and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over ten million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving over 100 million miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 15+ U.S. states.

The Perception Team at Waymo builds the system that "sees" the world around the self-driving car. We conduct novel research to address real-world perception problems and collaborate with research teams at Alphabet. Here at Waymo, we have access to millions of miles of driving data from a diverse set of sensors, enabling researchers like you to develop complex models and techniques at scale. Improvements deployed to our system can immediately advance our large fleet of autonomous vehicles.

Within Perception, the Sensor Health team's job is to make sure that sensors "just work" for the entire self-driving car software stack. We make sure that all sensors are properly calibrated and consistently monitored at all times. We process data from next-generation sensors on next-generation vehicle platforms and work closely with both hardware and software teams to provide the best possible sensor data from our sensors to our upstream customers. To this end, we develop sensor data alignment and calibration algorithms, a growing sensor health backend, and deploy our systems both into the Waymo Driver and our log processing backend.

In this hybrid remote/in-office role, you will report to a Senior Staff TLM.

You will:

  • Lead and build a team of ML engineers in charge of reliable sensing anomaly detection and calibration
  • Build a data flywheel to automatically generate suitable training data for rare instance sensor degradation events using VLMs
  • Own the entire sensor validation stack end to end
  • Drive and accelerate collaborations between perception, system engineering, evaluation, and Alphabet teams

You have:

  • MS in Computer Science, Robotics, Math, Physics or equivalent industry experience
  • 6+ years of experience in designing, training, and deploying ML-driven real-time robotics systems
  • 4+ years of experience leading technical teams and setting technical directions
  • 2+ years of people management experience

We prefer:

  • PhD in Computer Science, Robotics, Math, Physics, or a related technical field
  • Experience in robotics, autonomous systems, or related automotive industries.
  • Experience with various sensor modalities (e.g., LiDAR, radar, cameras) and their unique challenges.
  • Familiarity with early fusion multi modal sensor models and their development challenges
  • Experience with rare instance or zero-shot detection problems

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. 

Salary Range
$238,000—$302,000 USD

We appreciate your interest in Waymo. Waymo is proud to be an equal opportunity employer, committed to creating a culture of belonging and maintaining a supportive workplace for all employees. We welcome applicants of all backgrounds, and employment decisions are based on a candidate’s qualifications, experience, and alignment with job requirements and business needs. Waymo does not discriminate against, and prohibits harassment of, any applicant or employee based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, national origin, age, disability, military status, family status, pregnancy, genetic information or any other basis protected by applicable law. Waymo will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal records in accordance with applicable law. Waymo is committed to making sure our hiring process is accessible for all candidates. If you need assistance applying for a role or participating in the interview process due to a disability, please let the recruiting team know or email waymo-candidatesupport@google.com. (This email address is intended to be used only for requesting accommodations as part of the application process. Other inquiries will not receive a response.)

Some of our Benefits

Health and wellness

Our people are at the heart of everything we do. At Waymo, you can enjoy top-notch medical, dental and vision insurance, mental wellness support, gym membership, and special wellness programs.

Financial wellness

Your financial peace of mind is important to us. At Waymo, we offer competitive compensation, bonus opportunities, equity, employees provident fund, and lots of other perks and employee discounts.

Flexibility and time off

Take the time you need to relax and recharge. Enjoy the flexibility to work from another location for four weeks per year. We support an on-site or hybrid work model and offer remote working opportunities, paid time off, bereavement, sick, and parental leave. 

Supporting families

When it comes to growing your family or caring for your loved ones, you have our full support. Enhanced leave options include 26 weeks of paid leave for birthing parents and 18 weeks of paid leave for non-birthing parents.

Community and personal development

At Waymo, you'll find a range of opportunities to grow, connect, and give back. We offer education reimbursement, personal and professional development, mentorship, and other ways to connect through Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), other internal groups, and even time off to volunteer.

Cool perks

Access to Google offices, cafes, wellness centers, massages, and so much more. To support your wellbeing at home, you can enjoy at-home fitness and cooking classes, and more.

Ready to Apply?