--- title: 'Applied AI Research Engineer at Code Metal' canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/applied-ai-research-engineer-code-metal-boston-k4wbc5j3x8c9' type: 'job' last_seen: '2026-09-06' --- # Applied AI Research Engineer at Code Metal - **Company:** Code Metal - **Location:** Boston, MA - **Employment:** full-time - **Work type:** hybrid - **Posted:** 2026-07-02 - **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-06 - **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/code-metal/387734b5-9dfe-4b78-983b-fcd14de10b59 ## Job description ## ABOUT CODE METAL Code Metal is redefining code translation for mission-critical industries, helping defense partners move more quickly and reliably from algorithm to silicon. Our platform accelerates deployment of DSP, RF, communications, and embedded signal processing algorithms onto heterogeneous compute targets, including GPUs, FPGAs, ASICs, and edge SoCs. We also support automotive, aerospace, and semiconductor partners deploying complex algorithms onto constrained hardware with speed and rigor. ## ABOUT THE ROLE We're building next-generation AI systems that help military planners explore, compare, and evaluate operational courses of action. Our work combines frontier language models, simulation, planning, and verification into human-in-the-loop decision-support systems for defense applications. As an Applied AI Research Engineer, you’ll focus on human machine teaming and agentic AI to build systems that allow warfighters, planners, analysts, and decision-makers to explore operational choices with speed, confidence, and control. This role focuses on designing and building agentic AI systems – not chatbots. You'll develop multi-agent workflows, fine-tune and evaluate models, build retrieval pipelines, experiment with post-training techniques, and integrate AI with simulation and planning software. You'll work closely with AI researchers, software engineers, and defense experts to turn research ideas into production-ready capabilities. The goal is to make complex planning, wargaming, adjudication, and analysis workflows faster, more explainable, and more trustworthy. ## RESEARCH AREAS OF INTEREST An incomplete list of ongoing and near-term directions: - Human-machine teaming for AI-assisted course-of-action development, comparison, critique, refinement, and operational decision support - Agentic planning systems that integrate language models with simulation, doctrine retrieval, external tools, structured outputs, and deterministic verification - Adapting and optimizing foundation models through fine-tuning, post-training, distillation, reinforcement learning, and rigorous evaluation for planning and decision-support tasks - Multi-agent AI systems for Red/Blue planning, control-cell support, adjudication, branch-and-sequel analysis, and collaborative planning workflows - Building reliable AI systems using self-correction, structured reasoning, constraint-aware generation, verification, and robust tool use - Learning from human expertise through planner feedback, preferences, approvals, synthetic data generation, and human-in-the-loop improvement - Trustworthy AI for high-consequence applications, with an emphasis on explainability, provenance, traceability, auditability, uncertainty estimation, and model behavior analysis ## WHAT YOU’LL DO - Design and build agentic AI systems for planning, decision support, and human-machine teaming - Develop AI pipelines that integrate foundation models, retrieval, simulation, external tools, and deterministic software - Design, run, and analyze experiments to evaluate model and agent performance, reliability, traceability, latency, cost, and user trust - Fine-tune, distill, and evaluate foundation models for domain-specific planning, reasoning, and decision-support tasks - Build datasets, retrieval pipelines, automated benchmarks, and experiment infrastructure to support continuous model improvement and reproducible research - Partner with software engineers to transition research prototypes into scalable AI services - Collaborate with domain experts to translate operational workflows into AI-enabled capabilities while ensuring AI outputs remain explainable, reviewable, and under human control WHY CODE METAL? - Mission with impact: Build AI systems that help users reason through high-consequence operational decisions. - AI beyond demos: Work on systems where models are paired with software, verification, simulation, guardrails, and human oversight. - Greenfield research: Explore ambitious ideas in GenAI, RL, agentic workflows, evaluation, and human-machine teaming. - Small-team velocity: Move quickly from research question to prototype to user-facing capability. - Real users: See your work tested by planners, analysts, engineers, and operational stakeholders. ## MUST-HAVE CREDENTIALS - Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Engineering, Mathematics, Physics, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience. - 3+ years building AI, machine learning, or applied research systems. - Strong Python engineering skills. - Experience with PyTorch and modern LLM tooling (Transformers, vLLM, Hugging Face, etc.). - Experience building or deploying agentic AI systems, tool-calling workflows, or multi-step reasoning pipelines. - Experience fine-tuning, evaluating, or serving language models. - Experience with retrieval-augmented generation, embeddings, vector search, or knowledge retrieval systems. - Strong understanding of experiment design, benchmarking, and model evaluation. - Ability to move quickly from research prototype to production-quality implementation. - Eligible to obtain a U.S. security clearance. ## BENEFITS - Pay depends on experience, but we strive to be at the upper end of the salary range - Health care plan with 100% premium coverage, including medical, dental, and vision - 401k with 5% matching - Paid Time Off (uncapped vacation, plus sick and public holidays) - Flexible hybrid or remote work arrangement - Relocation assistance for qualifying employees Wage Transparency - The salary range for this role is not a guarantee of compensation or salary, as the final offer amount may vary based on factors including, but not limited to, individual proficiency, skills, experience, and location. We are an equal opportunity employer. US Citizenship may be required for certain project assignments involving security clearance. Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records. ## About Code Metal ## Company Overview - **One-liner**: Code Metal provides an AI-powered platform for verifiable code translation, enabling mission-critical industries to safely move software to different hardware architectures and languages with formal verification. - **Entity Type**: Private (Series B) - **Headquarters**: Boston, Massachusetts, United States - **Founded**: 2023 - **Founders**: Not publicly disclosed ## Core Business - **Primary industry/industries**: Software development tools; defense, automotive, aerospace, robotics, logistics - **Target customers**: B2B enterprise – engineering teams in safety-critical sectors (defense, automotive, aerospace, medical devices) - **Mission or purpose statement**: "Make AI trustworthy by safely delivering the last mile for mission critical industries" ([codemetal.ai](https://codemetal.ai/)) ## Products & Services - **Verifiable Code Translation Platform**: An AI-driven tool that automatically translates source code to a target architecture/language while generating a full test suite (functional and MCDC coverage) and formally verifying functional equivalence. Designed for safety-critical and compliance-heavy environments. ## Market Standing - **Valuation**: Not disclosed directly; latest round implies a post-money valuation in the hundreds of millions (conflicting reports). - **Key Metric – Total Funding**: Conflicting data – $178.45M or $184.45M (see sources). Latest round was a $125M Series B in February 2026, led by **Salesforce Ventures**. ([cbinsights.com](https://www.cbinsights.com/company/code-metal) and [pitchbook.com](https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/548367-58)) - **Notable Investors/Partners**: J2 Ventures, Shield Capital, Overmatch Ventures, Smith Point Capital, RTX Ventures, Salesforce Ventures (lead Series B), and 20+ others. - **Growth Signals**: - Headcount of 63 (as of mid-2026), growing 182.8% YoY. - Active job postings: 57, up 714% YoY. - Customers include a top‑5 global automotive OEM, a top aerospace company, and L3Harris. - Patents filed for code translation and program synthesis using LLMs. ## Competitive Advantages - **Formal verification + AI**: Unlike typical AI code assistants, Code Metal guarantees functional equivalence through automated testing and compliance checks, making it suitable for systems where failure is not an option. - **Chip portability**: Allows customers to avoid vendor lock-in by maintaining a single source-of-truth codebase deployable to any chip (ARM, RISC‑V, GPUs, etc.). - **Track record in defense/aerospace**: Already deployed with L3Harris and major aerospace/automotive firms, providing a strong reference base. ## Strategic Focus - **Go‑to‑market**: Deepening relationships with defense primes and automotive OEMs while expanding into robotics, telecommunications, and medical devices. - **Product development**: Investing in compiler and AI tooling, modeling & simulation, formal methods, and GPU/accelerator support (evident from open positions). - **Scaling team**: Aggressively hiring across engineering, research, and go‑to‑market roles (Boston, San Francisco, remote). ## Why Work Here - **Culture & impact**: "Building a global team of exceptional builders" – focus on solving hard problems at the intersection of AI, compilers, and safety-critical systems. - **Work policy**: Offers roles in Boston, San Francisco, and fully remote (US). Many engineering/research positions list "Boston, Remote, San Francisco". - **Notable perks/engineering culture**: Exposure to cutting-edge AI and formal methods; opportunity to work with top defense contractors; high autonomy and a flat structure (only 63 employees). - **Growth trajectory**: 182.8% headcount growth and fundraising momentum signal rapid scaling and career advancement potential. ## Sources 1. [codemetal.ai – Homepage](https://codemetal.ai/) 2. [codemetal.ai – Careers](https://www.codemetal.ai/careers) 3. [CBInsights – Company Profile & Financials](https://www.cbinsights.com/company/code-metal) 4. [LinkedIn – Company Page](https://www.linkedin.com/company/code-metal) 5. [PitchBook – Valuation & Funding](https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/548367-58) ## Other roles at Code Metal - [Head of Product](https://feeny.ai/job/head-of-product-code-metal-san-francisco-3fe8evm55ye8) — San Francisco, CA - [Director of Growth - Intelligence Community](https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-growth-intelligence-community-code-metal-washington-23fgkh9efc19) — Washington, DC - [Director of Growth - Navy](https://feeny.ai/job/director-of-growth-navy-code-metal-washington-y63stpbyzjwy) — Washington, DC - [Contracts Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/contracts-manager-code-metal-remote-v2tz41j69vs9) - [Engagement Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/engagement-manager-code-metal-remote-f036kye8vrz1) - [Forward Deployed Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/forward-deployed-engineer-code-metal-boston-xdnqk1qd41yn) — Boston, MA - [Solutions Architect](https://feeny.ai/job/solutions-architect-code-metal-san-francisco-9c6s8r4rbrgk) — San Francisco, CA - [Solutions Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/solutions-engineer-code-metal-boston-ajanmw74f5ec) — Boston, MA - [EVP of Enterprise Sales](https://feeny.ai/job/evp-of-enterprise-sales-code-metal-remote-ahds67gjdpvb) - [Director, Automotive Growth](https://feeny.ai/job/director-automotive-growth-code-metal-remote-xs6hh02rw43s)