---
title: 'Machine Learning Engineer – World Modeling at Institute of Foundation Models'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/machine-learning-engineer-world-modeling-institute-of-foundation-models-abu-5e8zxn168pds'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-07'
---

# Machine Learning Engineer – World Modeling at Institute of Foundation Models

- **Company:** Institute of Foundation Models
- **Location:** Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2025-07-10
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-07
- **Apply:** https://jobs.lever.co/ifm-us/7ac9e2ae-7ad2-439f-ba8f-7934a00af1ad

## Job description

## About the Institute of Foundation Models

The Institute of Foundation Models (IFM) at MBZUAI is a research lab dedicated to meaningful foundation model research — building models from scratch, understanding them deeply, and publishing work that shapes the field. You’ll work alongside world-class researchers and engineers on problems that directly define the models we ship.

## The Role

Join the PAN world model project — our effort to build world models: foundation models that simulate, predict, and interact with the physical world. As a Machine Learning Engineer, you’ll own the engineering backbone of PAN: large-scale video and simulation data pipelines, distributed training for diffusion transformers, game-engine simulation environments, and world-model integration into robotics — turning research ideas into reliable, scalable systems.

## What You'll Do

- Build and maintain large-scale video and simulation data pipelines — collection, cleaning, annotation, and filtering — to support world model training.
- Develop and optimize distributed training systems for large-scale diffusion transformers and world models.
- Build interactive simulation environments (e.g., Unreal Engine, Blueprint-based gyms, game integrations) for training and evaluating world models.
- Integrate world action models / video action models into robotics systems.
- Optimize inference and serving for real-time interaction, and turn research prototypes into reliable, reproducible systems.

## What We're Looking For

- BSc or above in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Robotics, or a related field, or equivalent industry experience.
- Hands-on experience with state-of-the-art video generative models and world models (e.g., Cosmos-3, LTX 2.3, Self-Forcing, Lingbot-World, or comparable systems).
- Deep expertise in at least one of the following areas:

-

- Full-stack data pipelines — large-scale video data pipelines and/or simulation data collection; annotation and filtering workflows for video / world model training.
- Model training & infrastructure — training large-scale diffusion transformers on large GPU clusters.
- Rendering engines & simulation — Unreal Engine and Blueprint-based gym environments, game-engine integration, building interactive simulated environments.
- World action models & robotics — world action models / video action models, action-conditioned video generation, world-model applications in robotics.
- Strong engineering expertise in deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch, with the ability to debug failures across the training/inference stack (memory issues, deadlocks, I/O bottlenecks).
- Highly proficient with modern AI coding agents and web-based coding tools (e.g., Claude Code, Codex, Cursor), and skilled at leveraging them to dramatically accelerate engineering workflows.

## Nice to Have

- Experience accelerating diffusion model inference (distillation, few-step generation, real-time interactive generation).
- Practical experience with web scraping and crawling frameworks (e.g., scrapy, playwright, selenium) for web-scale data curation.
- Experience with Unreal Engine C++/Blueprint development or other game-engine programming.
- Experience deploying world models in robotics or embodied-AI settings.

## About Institute of Foundation Models

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: The Institute of Foundation Models (IFM) is a global AI research lab dedicated to the open and independent development of frontier-class foundation models, operating under the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI).
- **Entity Type**: Academic Research Institute (part of MBZUAI, a university)
- **Headquarters**: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (with labs in Sunnyvale, CA, USA and Paris, France)
- **Founded**: 2026 (launched with Silicon Valley lab)
- **Founders**: Part of MBZUAI, led by President Eric Xing

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Artificial Intelligence research, foundation model development, open-source AI
- **Target customers**: Researchers, academia, industry partners, and the global AI community (B2B/Research/Public sector)
- **Mission**: To produce the world’s leading models across modalities while ensuring responsible, open, and socially meaningful impact.

## Products & Services
For each major offering:
- **JAIS Series**: State-of-the-art open-source Arabic LLM covering Modern Standard Arabic and regional dialects, including Moroccan Arabic (Darija). Fully documented training lifecycle.
- **Vicuna**: Lightweight open chatbot surpassing 90% of ChatGPT and Bard quality.
- **K2 (K2-65B)**: Large language model with advanced reasoning capabilities, focusing on sustainable performance. Updated version soon to be released.
- **PAN World Model**: Next-gen foundation model for embodied reasoning and physical-world simulation, integrating multimodal inputs (language, video, spatial data, physical actions). Includes PAN-Agent for multimodal reasoning tasks.
- **FM For Bio – GET**: Domain-specific model for biology.
- **LLM360**: Open-source framework enhancing transparency and collaboration in LLM research, providing training code, datasets, and model checkpoints.
- **Research partnerships**: Collaboration with academia, startups, and enterprises via shared compute, co-publishing, and co-development.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not applicable (non-commercial research institute)
- **Key Metric**: Funded by MBZUAI; specific budget not publicly disclosed. Notable open-source model releases (JAIS, Vicuna, K2, PAN).
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: MBZUAI, with international advisory boards and peer review processes. Partnerships with industry leaders, academic institutions, and public organizations.
- **Growth Signals**: Launch of Silicon Valley lab in Sunnyvale, CA (2026); expansion into Paris and Abu Dhabi nodes; active hiring for research interns, distributed ML engineers, HPC engineers; release of flagship models (PAN, K2 update).

## Competitive Advantages
- **Openness & transparency**: Full release of training code, datasets, and model checkpoints through LLM360 – one of the most transparent approaches in AI.
- **Global research network**: Three hubs (Abu Dhabi, Silicon Valley, Paris) combining academic rigor with startup agility.
- **Access to large-scale compute**: High-performance computing infrastructure for training frontier models.
- **Multilingual & cultural focus**: JAIS addresses underrepresentation of Arabic and other languages, preserving cultural authenticity.
- **World model innovation**: PAN differentiates from text-only models by predicting comprehensive world states for advanced reasoning and simulation.

## Strategic Focus
- Continue building open, powerful foundation models across language, vision, multimodal, and domain-specific systems.
- Expand global collaboration and talent acquisition, especially in Silicon Valley.
- Advance responsible AI with safety systems and international advisory boards.
- Drive real-world impact through partnerships in scientific discovery, human-AI interaction, and public good.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Collaborative, cutting-edge academic research environment with a mission to open-source AI for global benefit. Teams span Abu Dhabi, Paris, and Silicon Valley.
- **Remote/hybrid/office**: All listed roles are **on-site** (Sunnyvale, CA or Abu Dhabi). No remote policy indicated.
- **Notable perks**: Work with world-class researchers, access to large-scale compute, opportunity to publish and contribute to open-source models. The institute combines the agility of a startup with the resources of an established university.
- **Current openings**: AI Research Internship (LLM), Distributed Machine Learning Engineer, Eval360 Error Analysis Engineer, High Performance Computing Software Engineer (Supercomputing) – all on-site in Sunnyvale or Abu Dhabi.

## Sources
1. [ifm.ai](https://ifm.ai/)
2. [ifm.ai/about](https://ifm.ai/about/)
3. [jobs.lever.co/ifm-us](https://jobs.lever.co/ifm-us)
4. [LinkedIn – Institute of Foundation Models](https://www.linkedin.com/company/institute-of-foundation-models)
5. [MBZUAI News – Launch of IFM and Silicon Valley Lab](https://mbzuai.ac.ae/news/mbzuai-launches-institute-of-foundation-models-and-establishes-silicon-valley-ai-lab/)

## Other roles at Institute of Foundation Models

- [Research Scientist – World Modeling, Data](https://feeny.ai/job/research-scientist-world-modeling-data-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-bch8rt52tddk) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Community Development Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/community-development-manager-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-1ns2xzrzec79) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Social Media Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/social-media-manager-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-nppzja97rfm9) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Content Marketing & Editorial, Sr. Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/content-marketing-editorial-sr-manager-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-9yeba8pbf82f) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Senior Communications Consultant](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-communications-consultant-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-q3waewdeghjx) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Admin Operations Coordinator](https://feeny.ai/job/admin-operations-coordinator-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-299qtkyk8h27) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Inference Optimization Intern – Performance Modeling](https://feeny.ai/job/inference-optimization-intern-performance-modeling-institute-of-foundation-6dp7c44ge7e3) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Eval360 - Error Analysis Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/eval360-error-analysis-engineer-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-4yt0zm9r4y3a) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [AI Research Internship - WM](https://feeny.ai/job/ai-research-internship-wm-institute-of-foundation-models-sunnyvale-59229gv1vw1g) — Sunnyvale, CA
- [Research Scientist, Agentic Data & Benchmarking](https://feeny.ai/job/research-scientist-agentic-data-benchmarking-institute-of-foundation-models-knfx9e7pzxej) — Sunnyvale, CA