Founding Research Scientist, Computer Vision (PhD)
About the role
About
Rudus is an AI-powered takeoff platform for structural and site concrete. We accelerate concrete takeoffs by 70%+ with AI trained specifically on structural and civil drawings- counting, measuring, and reading sheets so estimators can focus on winning bids.
The Role
You'll own the research behind our drawing-understanding stack: detecting structural and site elements on noisy real-world plan sets, pattern-matching footings and curb runs, interpreting schedules and cross-sheet details, and comparing drawing revisions. Your models ship into production and get evaluated by professional estimators on real bids — feedback loops measured in days, not review cycles.
What You’ll Do
- Advance detection and autocomplete models for structural elements (footings, slabs, columns, walls) and site elements (curbs, paving, sidewalks, joint layouts)
- Build document-understanding systems for schedules, specs, and section details, including cross-sheet reasoning
- Solve geometry problems: auto-scale detection, boundary completion, smart exclusions, revision diffing
- Design training and eval pipelines on customer drawing data, improving accuracy project over project
What We’re Looking For
- PhD (or equivalent research experience) in computer vision, ML, or a related field
- Track record turning research into working systems- strong Python required
- Experience with document AI, object detection, vectorized/CAD-like data, or multimodal LLMs
- Excited by messy real-world data over benchmark leaderboards
About Rudus
AI Takeoffs for Concrete
Required skills
Other roles at Rudus
Refer someone
Know someone great for this role?
Share your link. If they get hired through Standout, you get $3,000.
Job details
Salary
$150,000 - $200,000
Equity
0.3% - 2%
Location
San Francisco, New York
Experience
0+ years
Funding
Last stage
Seed
Investors
What happens next.
No applications, no recruiter spam. Just the intro.
Confirm the fit
A few questions to make sure this role is the right shape for you. Two minutes.
I pitch you to the company
I write the intro, send it to the founder, and handle the back-and-forth.
A meeting lands on your calendar
If they’re a yes, I book the chat. You show up — that’s the whole job-hunt.