Member of Technical Staff, Perception
- Salary
- $180K - $300K
- Level
- Staff
- Work type
- Hybrid · San Mateo
Not stated in the posting: visa.
Open. First seen 6 November 2026.
About the role
XDOF's standard text
At XDOF, we’re at an inflection point. Frontier labs are racing to build general-purpose robots, and high-quality training data is the bottleneck. We’re building the foundation behind the foundation models – the data collection systems, operational capability, exabyte-scale data warehouse, and software toolchain – to help our partners drive the field forward.
The Perception Algorithm team transforms raw multimodal sensor data into high-quality robot training annotations. You will be deeply involved in the complete loop from data collection to model delivery — sensor calibration, SLAM localization, human pose estimation, perception model training, and embedded deployment. Your work directly determines the quality ceiling of our training data.
Core Responsibilities
Human Pose Estimation
- Design and optimize hand pose estimation pipelines supporting accurate joint angle extraction from teleoperation data collection
- Build full-body pose estimation systems for motion capture and teleoperation action annotation ground truth generation
- Research and apply vision-based pose estimation methods (markerless) to reduce data collection costs
- Retargeting pose estimation outputs with robot joint angle data to generate consistent training annotations
Robot Perception & Calibration
- Design and maintain intrinsic/extrinsic calibration pipelines for multi-camera arrays (factory calibration + online recalibration)
- Build visual SLAM / V-SLAM systems supporting real-time localization and scene reconstruction on data collection platforms
- Implement hand-eye calibration between cameras and robot end-effectors
- Develop temporal alignment solutions across multimodal sensors (cameras, IMU, data gloves, force sensors)
Perception Model Training & Deployment
- Train and iterate on perception models including object detection, instance segmentation, and 6DoF pose estimation
- Optimize model inference using TensorRT / CUDA for real-time performance on robot embedded platforms
- Write custom CUDA kernels for low-level acceleration of perception tasks
- Design evaluation metric frameworks for perception models; continuously track the relationship between model performance and data quality
End-to-End Loop from Data Collection to Model Delivery
- Contribute to the design of automated annotation pipelines that convert sensor data into structured training labels
- Build Auto QA modules to filter low-quality data including anomalous frames, failed demonstrations, and sensor dropouts
- Collaborate with ML engineers and data infrastructure teams to ensure perception output formats meet downstream VLA model training requirements
- Establish feedback mechanisms linking perception accuracy to model training outcomes, continuously improving annotation quality
Requirements
Must-Have
- 5+ years of industry experience in robot perception or computer vision
- Strong 3D vision fundamentals: stereo and structured-light camera principles, 3D reconstruction
- Proficiency with SLAM frameworks (ORB-SLAM, VINS-Mono, FastLIO, etc.) or V-SLAM system development experience
- Hands-on engineering experience with human pose estimation: hand joints (MediaPipe, MANO) or full-body pose (OpenPose, SMPLify, etc.)
- Proficient in deep learning training frameworks for perception model training, tuning, and evaluation
- TensorRT deployment experience with real-time inference optimization on embedded platforms (Jetson, Horizon, etc.)
- CUDA programming fundamentals; ability to write or debug custom kernels
- Proficient in C++ and Python with ROS / ROS2 development experience
- Proficient with AI coding agents
Nice to Have
- Engineering experience with 6DoF object pose estimation (FoundPose, FoundationPose, GDR-Net, etc.)
- Familiarity with 3D Gaussian Splatting or NeRF for scene reconstruction or data augmentation
- Experience with robot manipulation or teleoperation systems
- End-to-end development experience with automated annotation pipelines or ground truth generation systems
- Published research in perception, pose estimation, or robotics
What We Offer
- Direct involvement in the most critical technical challenge in embodied intelligence: producing high-quality robot training data
- An environment working alongside top-tier robotics engineers and ML researchers
- Proprietary hardware platforms (humanoid robots, camera arrays, data gloves)
- A fast-paced, high-autonomy 0→1 work environment
What this role asks for
Particular to this role
CUDA · Computer Vision
Rare in XDOF's other 33 open postings.
In most of XDOF's ads
Data Warehousing · Python
Named in most of its open postings, whatever the role.
91% of this description is written for the role. The rest is XDOF's standard text, folded away below.
Compared with XDOF's other open jobs.
The team: AI & ML HIRES STEADILY
This role is one of 10 open in AI & ML. 4 were posted in the last 30 days and the oldest in June: a team that hires all year rather than one being built.
WHAT THE TEAM WORKS WITH, ACROSS ITS POSTINGS
Machine Learning (8 of 10), Data Warehousing (6 of 10), Python (6 of 10), PyTorch (6 of 10), C++ (4 of 10), Computer Vision (4 of 10), CUDA (4 of 10)
OTHER ROLES ON THIS TEAM
- Member of Technical Staff, Vision/Language Research posted Oct 23
- Member of Technical Staff, Vision/Language Research posted Oct 23
- Member of Technical Staff, Robotics Infrastructure posted Oct 22
- Member of Technical Staff, Robotics Infrastructure posted Oct 22
- Member of Technical Staff, Research Engineer posted Sep 8
- Member of Technical Staff, Research Engineer posted Sep 8
- Member of Technical Staff, Perception posted Jun 17
- Member of Technical Staff, Vision / Language Engineer posted Jun 5
- Member of Technical Staff, Vision / Language Engineer posted Jun 5
From the team and dates on XDOF's own job board.
Other openings for this role
2 open postings for this role in San Mateo Hybrid, first posted 3 October 2026. The company is likely hiring for more than one position. None has been taken down and posted again.
- 6 November 2026 – open (this posting)
- 3 October 2026 – open
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