Applied Researcher

San Francisco, CA
Full-time
Visa Sponsorship

About the role

Software should be beautiful.

Variant is code generation with creativity and taste. Instead of a confined conversation, you can generate endless designs from a single idea. Freely explore, discover directions you wouldn’t have thought of, and build better software as a result.

We're well-capitalized and looking for an applied researcher to join us at Variant.

Job Responsibilities:

  • Design, train, and evaluate deep neural networks and LLMs
  • Own experiments end-to-end: hypotheses, datasets, metrics, results
  • Prototype fast; turn promising ideas into reliable systems
  • Collaborate with engineering and design to make ideas real
  • Write clearly: papers, docs, and crisp experiment reports
  • Don't compromise between rigor and shipping fast
  • See what needs to be done and do it

Minimal qualifications:

  • 2+ years in PhD program or in industry
  • Experience training deep neural networks
  • Proficiency in frameworks like Pytorch
  • Published 1 or more papers in the subject of deep learning

Ideal qualifications:

  • Experience training LLMs, including SFT, RL-based techniques, etc.
  • Experience in the domain of code generation
  • At least 1 paper accepted into a top conference
  • Proficiency in best software engineering practices
  • Repeated experience formulating, structuring, and answering open ended questions
  • Passionate about visual design or UI design; prior work in the space

We've kept our team small by design. Your code will matter from day one, and its impact will compound over time. This will be the most meaningful work of your career.

We work from a beautiful space in San Francisco where we dream up the future and make it real together. We’re well-capitalized and backed by notable investors.

If you've built things you're proud of, we'd love to see them.

About Variant

Creative intelligence

Required skills

ML
Python
Torch/PyTorch
Machine Learning
Deep Learning
Reinforcement learning (RL)
Natural Language Processing
Computer Vision

Other roles at Variant

Interested?

Let me introduce you to the founders.

Skip the process

Job details

Salary

$149,999 - $300,000

Equity

0.5% - 1.75%

Location

San Francisco, CA

Experience

0+ years

Company

NameVariant
IndustryEngineering, Product and Design
Team Size5

Funding

Total raised

$500K

Last stage

Pre-seed

Investors

Y Combinator
Kindred Ventures
TTranspose Platform Management

Founders

Daniel Bulhosa Solorzano

Daniel Bulhosa Solorzano

Co-Founder, CTO

LinkedIn
Benjamin South Lee

Benjamin South Lee

Co-Founder, CEO

LinkedIn

What happens next.

No applications, no recruiter spam. Just the intro.

01

Confirm the fit

A few questions to make sure this role is the right shape for you. Two minutes.

02

I pitch you to the company

I write the intro, send it to the founder, and handle the back-and-forth.

03

A meeting lands on your calendar

If they’re a yes, I book the chat. You show up — that’s the whole job-hunt.