---
title: 'Principal Machine Learning Engineer, Data Mining at Motional'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/principal-machine-learning-engineer-data-mining-motional-boston-massachusetts-mt1rh7xnmdx8'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-13'
---

# Principal Machine Learning Engineer, Data Mining at Motional

- **Company:** Motional
- **Location:** Boston Massachusetts, United States / Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, United States
- **Compensation:** $240k–$330k
- **Work type:** remote
- **Posted:** 2026-06-22
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-13
- **Apply:** https://motional.com/open-positions/?gh_jid=7779985003#/7779985003

## Job description

Mission Summary:

At Motional, we're transforming how autonomous vehicles discover critical intelligence hidden within petabytes of multimodal sensor data. Our next-generation autonomous driving stack depends on finding the rare edge cases, long-tail scenarios, and model errors that matter most. [Omnitag](https://motional.com/news/technical-speaking-omnitag-ml-powered-multimodal-data-mining-framework), our ML-powered multimodal data mining framework, is the engine that powers this discovery.

As a Principal Machine Learning Engineer, you will serve as a foundational technical leader shaping the long-term, multi-year vision for our foundation model post-training ecosystem. While training foundation models from scratch is on our horizon, your immediate mandate is to architect the systems that adapt, align, and optimize massive multimodal models for our autonomy stack.

Armed with a strong sense of product, you will ensure our technical investments directly translate into downstream value, accelerating edge-case discovery, reducing engineering costs, and improving the final autonomous driving product. You will tackle highly complex, ambiguous problems, creating clarity and defining objectives that pay future dividends for the entire company. By championing deep cross-team collaboration, you will seamlessly connect ML capabilities with our Autonomy and Infrastructure organizations, breaking down silos to ensure smooth execution. Operating at the highest levels of technical maturity, you will solve the hardest technical challenges that few others can, setting the standard for state-of-the-art model distillation, advanced alignment techniques, automated agentic reasoning workflows, and the ultra-efficient deployment of billion-parameter models.

What You'll Do:

- Set the Technical Direction for Data Mining: Define the multi-year ML roadmap for our multimodal data-mining platform (Omnitag). Turn complex, ambiguous problems into clear objectives, balancing long-term foundational investments (e.g., agentic pipelines) with short-term tactical goals to drive maximum impact.
- Build the Data Flywheel: Own the full lifecycle of our ML data pipelines to close the active-learning loop. You will align massive multimodal teacher models and distill them into efficient student models for exabyte-scale search, accelerating model error diagnosis and reducing compute costs for automated curation.
- Architect Massive-Scale Systems & Tackle the Hardest Challenges: Design the architecture for applying billion-parameter models to real-world AV logs. As the lead implementer for our toughest technical bottlenecks, you will push the boundaries of parameter-efficient fine-tuning, optimize inference latency for large-scale retrieval, and build RL-driven reasoning systems—all while proactively managing system reliability and cloud footprint.
- Champion Cross-Functional Initiatives: Act as the technical bridge between Data Mining, Autonomy, and Infrastructure. Armed with a strong product sense, you will deeply understand the edge cases the autonomy stack needs to solve next and coordinate phased rollouts to seamlessly integrate new discovery capabilities into the core AV development loop.
- Lead and Grow a High-Performing Pod: Serve as a hands-on player-coach, directly guiding up to 3 engineers. Delegate ownership, coach your team to deliver state-of-the-art implementations, and advocate for tooling and practices that elevate developer productivity and reinforce Motional's culture of engineering excellence.

What We're Looking For (Must-Haves):

- BS in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field, or equivalent professional experience.
- 12+ years of hands-on machine learning engineering experience, with a proven track record of owning the end-to-end development cycle of enterprise-scale ML systems, from experiment design through infrastructure, testing, rollout, monitoring, and iteration.
- Exceptional technical maturity, with a track record of building and shipping impact that is innovative, broad in reach (affecting many teams or orgs), and pays future dividends for the company.
- Proven ability to solve technical problems that few others can, the person others seek out for complex ML infrastructure, deep learning architectures, and production optimization.
- Deep experience training large-scale models from the ground up, including distributed training across multi-node GPU clusters, data pipeline and curation strategy, scaling and evaluation methodology, and the practical debugging of large training runs.
- Demonstrated ownership of a technical roadmap for a team or problem area, including balancing competing objectives (impact, quality, engineering time, compute cost) and making deliberate tradeoffs between long-term foundational investment and short-term tactical goals.
- Ability to create clarity from ambiguous, complex problems, decomposing them concisely, defining objectives, and establishing measures of progress for yourself and your team.
- Deep, generalist ML expertise spanning massive-scale model training, hardware-optimized deployment, and production ML orchestration in cloud environments (AWS, GCP, or Azure).
- Experience leading cross-team initiatives, including coordinating phased rollouts and migrations across dependent teams, and mentoring engineers to raise the bar around you.
- Strong oral and written communication skills. You can clearly explain complex technical problems using data and analysis, and communicate proposals in a way that earns buy-in and creates alignment.

Bonus Points (Nice-to-Haves):

- MS/PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field.
- Experience as a Tech Lead Manager (TLM) or in direct people management, coaching and growing small teams of 2–3 engineers.
- Background in autonomous driving, robotics, or complex real-time decision-making systems.
- Experience with massive-scale ML data mining, multimodal foundation models, and embodied AI.
- Hands-on experience pretraining or post-training a foundation model, data curation at scale, pretraining or continued-pretraining recipes, SFT/RLHF or other alignment methods, and evaluation harness design.
- Experience with model compression and adaptation at scale, knowledge distillation (teacher/student), parameter-efficient fine-tuning, or quantization for high-throughput inference.
- Experience with large-scale retrieval or search systems, or RL for reasoning and decision-making.
- Deep knowledge of enterprise model serving (TF Serving, Triton, TorchServe) and modern MLOps platforms.
- Experience building agentic pipelines or LLM-driven reasoning and tool-use workflows.
- A strong portfolio of publications, patents, or significant open-source contributions that demonstrates influence on the broader engineering community.

The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors including but not limited to specific skills, experience and expertise, role location, certifications, licenses, and business needs. The estimated compensation range listed in this job posting reflects base salary only. This role may include additional forms of compensation such as a bonus or company equity. The recruiter assigned to this role can share more information about the specific compensation and benefit details associated with this role during the hiring process.

Candidates for certain positions are eligible to participate in Motional’s benefits program. Motional’s benefits include but are not limited to medical, dental, vision, 401k with a company match, health saving accounts, life insurance, pet insurance, and more.

Salary Range $240,000—$330,000 USD

Motional is a driverless technology company making autonomous vehicles a safe, reliable, and accessible reality. We’re driven by something more.

Our journey is always people first.

We aren't just developing driverless cars; we're creating safer roadways, more equitable transportation options, and making our communities better places to live, work, and connect. Our team is made up of engineers, researchers, innovators, dreamers and doers, who are creating a technology with the potential to transform the way we move.

Higher purpose, greater impact.

We’re creating first-of-its-kind technology that will transform transportation. To do so successfully, we must design for everyone in our cities and on our roads. We believe in building a great place to work through a progressive, global culture that is diverse, inclusive, and ensures people feel valued at every level of the organization. Diversity helps us to see the world differently; it’s not only good for our business, it’s the right thing to do.

Scale up, not starting up.

Our team is behind some of the industry's largest leaps forward, including the first fully-autonomous cross-country drive in the U.S, the launch of the world's first robotaxi pilot, and operation of the world's longest-standing public robotaxi fleet. We’re driven to scale; we’re moving towards commercialization of our technology, and we need team members who are ready to embrace change and challenges.

Formed as a joint venture between Hyundai Motor Group and Aptiv, Motional is fundamentally changing how people move through their lives. Headquartered in Boston, Motional has operations in the U.S and Asia. For more information, visit  [www.Motional.com](https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3300142-1&h=1642745316&u=https%3A%2F%2Fc212.net%2Fc%2Flink%2F%3Ft%3D0%26l%3Den%26o%3D3253528-1%26h%3D3781125006%26u%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fc212.net%252Fc%252Flink%252F%253Ft%253D0%2526l%253Den%2526o%253D3089636-1%2526h%253D3468778127%2526u%253Dhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fc212.net%25252Fc%25252Flink%25252F%25253Ft%25253D0%252526l%25253Den%252526o%25253D2881693-1%252526h%25253D646020682%252526u%25253Dhttps%2525253A%2525252F%2525252Furldefense.com%2525252Fv3%2525252F__http%2525253A%2525252Fwww.motional.com%2525252F__%2525253B!!KT8c38mO!j78LjnhAm2VK7Fu23VO6KlwqDXvVTQFMzmyzieKQqZDQksh2tpWEseK4to8eKzwsEwI%25252524%252526a%25253Dwww.Motional.com%2526a%253Dwww.Motional.com%26a%3Dwww.Motional.com&a=www.Motional.com) and follow us on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/motionaldrive), [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/67123512/), [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/motionaldrive/) and [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr__mGPkBb-KMoYWbSGuA9w).

Motional AD Inc. is an EOE. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. To comply with Federal Law, we participate in E-Verify. All newly-hired employees are queried through this electronic system established by the DHS and the SSA to verify their identity and employment eligibility.

## About Motional

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Motional is an autonomous vehicle technology company developing Level 4 driverless systems for robotaxi and delivery services.
- **Entity Type**: Private (joint venture between Hyundai Motor Group and Aptiv)
- **Headquarters**: Boston, Massachusetts, USA (with offices in Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Santa Monica, and Singapore)
- **Founded**: 2020 (formed as a joint venture; predecessor companies nuTonomy and Ottomatika founded in 2013)
- **Founders**: Motional was created as a joint venture; predecessor companies nuTonomy was co-founded by Karl Iagnemma and Emilio Frazzoli, and Ottomatika was founded by Raj Rajkumar

## Core Business
- **Primary Industry**: Autonomous Vehicle Technology / Self-Driving Systems
- **Target Customers**: B2B partnerships with mobility networks (ride-hail and delivery platforms like Uber), enterprise fleet operators, and mobility service providers
- **Mission**: To make driverless vehicles a safe, reliable, and accessible reality, fundamentally changing how the world moves.

## Products & Services
- **Robotaxi Service (Motional Driverless)**: A fully driverless, Level 4 autonomous vehicle platform designed for ride-hail services. Currently operating commercial robotaxi services on Uber in Las Vegas as of March 2026.
- **Autonomous Delivery**: The same robotaxi platform is designed to support autonomous delivery services, complementing the ride-hail offering.
- **nuScenes Open Source Dataset**: An industry-leading open-source dataset for autonomous vehicle research, demonstrating Motional's commitment to safety-focused data sharing.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed (private joint venture)
- **Key Metric**: Over 130,000 autonomous rides provided with zero at-fault incidents since predecessor companies began in 2013.
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Hyundai Motor Group (joint venture partner), Aptiv (joint venture partner), Uber (commercial robotaxi partnership launched in Las Vegas, March 2026).
- **Growth Signals**: Commercial launch of robotaxi service on Uber in Las Vegas (March 2026), over a decade of autonomous driving development, significant scaling of driverless testing operations.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Industry-Leading Safety Record**: Zero at-fault incidents across 130,000+ autonomous rides, with safety as the company's bedrock principle.
- **Unique Joint Venture Structure**: Combines Hyundai's manufacturing expertise (vehicle production, global scale) with Aptiv's automotive technology leadership (sensors, software, integration).
- **Proven Commercial Deployment**: First-mover advantage with a live, paying robotaxi service integrated into Uber's platform in a major US city.
- **Open Source Leadership**: The nuScenes dataset is a widely used industry benchmark, establishing Motional as a thought leader and attracting top talent.

## Strategic Focus
- **Commercialization at Scale**: Expanding the Las Vegas robotaxi service and replicating the model in new markets.
- **Platform Versatility**: Developing the same core technology for both ride-hail and delivery to maximize revenue per vehicle and market opportunity.
- **Safety-First Approach**: Continuing to lead the industry in transparency and safety data sharing to build public trust and regulatory confidence.
- **Partnership Ecosystem**: Deepening integration with Uber and pursuing additional mobility network partnerships globally.

## Why Work Here
- **Purpose-Driven Mission**: Employees are motivated by a clear social purpose: creating safer roads, more equitable transportation, and reducing emissions — not just building technology for profit.
- **Cutting-Edge Engineering Challenges**: Work on the hardest problems in robotics, machine learning, AI, software, and sensor fusion, with direct impact on a product already on the streets.
- **Culture & Values**: Described as "more human than big tech and more structured than start-ups." Core values include Safety as Bedrock, Build for Everyone (diversity & inclusion), Take Ownership, and Deliver the Future.
- **Global, Collaborative Team**: Offices across the US (Boston, Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Santa Monica) and Asia (Singapore), with a culture that emphasizes collaboration across teams and disciplines.
- **Career Growth & Benefits**: Competitive benefits package, investment in employee development, and a "people first" approach that values career growth and well-being. Remote/hybrid policy not explicitly stated but global office presence suggests flexibility.

## Sources
1. [Motional Website](https://motional.com/)
2. [Motional Careers Page](https://motional.com/careers)
3. [Motional - What We Do](https://motional.com/what-we-do)
4. [Motional - Life at Motional](https://motional.com/life-motional)
5. [Motional - Open Positions](https://motional.com/open-positions)

## Other roles at Motional

- [Strategy Analyst](https://feeny.ai/job/strategy-analyst-motional-boston-massachusetts-1jvepw14d7x7) — Boston Massachusetts, United States
- [Associate Vehicle Test Specialist](https://feeny.ai/job/associate-vehicle-test-specialist-motional-las-vegas-nevada-pe21sr2v73q7) — Las Vegas Nevada, United States
- [Senior Counsel](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-counsel-motional-las-vegas-nevada-ghba1767rpfs) — Las Vegas Nevada, United States
- [Staff Design Release Engineer, Human-Machine Interface & User Experience](https://feeny.ai/job/staff-design-release-engineer-human-machine-interface-user-experience-motional-yae524z923fv) — Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, United States
- [Senior Strategic Program Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-strategic-program-manager-motional-boston-massachusetts-dkwkg466wqey) — Boston Massachusetts, United States
- [Senior Motion Planning Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-motion-planning-engineer-motional-boston-massachusetts-g8z0k5fkgzqs) — Boston Massachusetts, United States / Las Vegas Nevada, United States / Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, United States
- [Senior AV Test Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-av-test-engineer-motional-pittsburgh-pennsylvania-9cm1ww7bjgwc) — Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, United States
- [IT Support Specialist [6 Month Contract]](https://feeny.ai/job/it-support-specialist-6-month-contract-motional-singapore-yjd8zt6j89g8) — Singapore
- [Sr. QA Automation Test Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/sr-qa-automation-test-engineer-motional-las-vegas-nevada-4ba9xexjqtd9) — Las Vegas Nevada, United States
- [Virtual Test Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/virtual-test-engineer-motional-las-vegas-nevada-23wwdc1kar11) — Las Vegas Nevada, United States / Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, United States