Lead AI Researcher (Hybrid)

Cisco
Seattle, San Jose
Workplace: HybridFull timeUSD 216,300 - 280,800 annuallyFunction: Research & Scientific (R&D)Experience: 12+ yearsEducation: bachelorsSkills: ["Interpersonal skills","Communication","Stakeholder influence"]

Lead end-to-end development of purpose-built large language models that strengthen and automate Cisco’s networking, security, data center, and observability infrastructure. Drive advanced generative AI pre-training (beyond standard fine-tuning) across full-cycle projects, translate research into scalable systems, and publish in top AI venues to establish thought leadership.

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FursaFursa
Cisco
Cisco
2 days ago

Lead AI Researcher (Hybrid)

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Last checked: 23 hours agoStatus: Live

Job Summary

Lead end-to-end development of purpose-built large language models that strengthen and automate Cisco’s networking, security, data center, and observability infrastructure. Drive advanced generative AI pre-training (beyond standard fine-tuning) across full-cycle projects, translate research into scalable systems, and publish in top AI venues to establish thought leadership.
Location: Seattle, San Jose
Workplace: Hybrid
Employment Type: Full time
Job Function: Research & Scientific (R&D)

Key Responsibilities

  • •Develop purpose-built large language models to secure and optimize Cisco’s proprietary networking, security, data center, and observability infrastructure.
  • •Drive advanced pre-training initiatives to create foundational models that deliver unique value across the product portfolio.
  • •Conduct innovative generative AI research to improve model capabilities for networking automation and human-computer interaction.
  • •Collaborate with cross-functional teams to integrate research breakthroughs into tangible business solutions.
  • •Publish research in top-tier AI venues and contribute to the broader scientific community to establish Cisco’s thought leadership.

Pay and Benefits

Salary: USD 216,300 - 280,800 annually
Equity and Bonus:Equity
Perks:Health InsuranceDentalVision401kPaid ParentalDisabilityLife InsuranceRsus

Key Requirements

  • •STEM bachelor’s with 12+ years, or STEM master’s with 8+ years, or a PhD in STEM with 5+ years of relevant research experience.
  • •Experience leading or contributing to full-cycle LLM or foundational model pre-training, including distillation/continual pre-training, dataset curation, tokenization strategy, and training pipeline execution.
  • •Minimum 3 peer-reviewed publications in top-tier AI venues (ACL, EMNLP, ICLR, ICML, NAACL, or NeurIPS).
  • •3+ years using PyTorch or TensorFlow to implement and train models on distributed clusters (100+ GPUs).
  • •2+ years applying ML models to networking, data center, security, or observability datasets to solve complex system-level problems.
Experience:12+ years
Education:Bachelor's in STEM
Skills:Interpersonal skillsCommunicationStakeholder influence
Tech Stack:PyTorchTensorFlow

Company Brief

Cisco
Global technology company that designs, manufactures, and sells networking hardware, telecommunications equipment, and high-technology services and products for enterprises, service providers, and governments worldwide.
Industry: Networking Equipment
Company Size: Enterprise (1,001+ employees)
Revenue: USD 1B+
Growth: Public Company
Valuation: Public Company (Market Cap in USD)
Funding: IPO / Publicly Listed
Headquarters: San Jose, United States
Founded: 1984
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Glassdoor: 4.0
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