At Pickle Robot, we're on a mission to automate global supply chains with Physical AI. Our robots work alongside warehouse teams to unload trucks and containers — one of the toughest, most understaffed jobs in logistics — making the work safer, faster, and more efficient for the people doing it. Loading trucks comes next, followed by the Dill Autonomy Engine: generalized autonomy that will eventually orchestrate robots across entire logistics processes.
We're looking for a dynamic and driven Physical AI Architect to revolutionize the future of warehouse automation. This is a senior technical role for someone who is equal parts deep practitioner and pragmatic builder, with a track record of shipping advanced AI systems into production hardware.
If you measure success in deployed systems rather than papers, this role is for you.
What You'll Do
- Serve as the technical architect for Pickle Robot's Physical AI stack, owning the end-to-end design of perception, planning, and control systems deployed on production hardware
- Lead the application of diffusion-based policy learning and optimal control techniques to robot manipulation and picking tasks, with a focus on real-world reliability and cycle time performance
- Define the technical roadmap for how diffusion models and optimal control complement each other in Pickle Robot's autonomy architecture, and build internal alignment around that vision
- Drive hardware integration across sensors, compute, and actuators, partnering closely with firmware, mechanical, and software engineering teams to ensure AI systems are co-designed with the physical platform and grounded in operational realities
- Identify and resolve performance bottlenecks at the intersection of model inference, motion execution, and hardware throughput
- Mentor senior engineers and help grow the technical depth of the broader autonomy team
What You'll Bring
- Demonstrated track record of shipping AI-powered systems to production — we want to hear about systems you've deployed, not just prototyped
- MS or PhD in Robotics, Computer Science, or a related field, or equivalent demonstrated expertise
- Deep subject matter expertise in diffusion models applied to robot learning (e.g., diffusion policies, score-based generative models for behavior cloning or planning), plus strong command of optimal control theory and practice (MPC, trajectory optimization, feedback control) — and the architectural judgment to combine both effectively
- Hands-on experience with hardware integration: sensor pipelines (RGB-D, force/torque, encoders), embedded compute (NVIDIA Jetson, ARM SoCs, FPGAs), and actuator interfaces
- Proficiency in Python and C++; familiarity with ROS 2 or equivalent robotics middleware
- Experience with real-time systems constraints and the performance tradeoffs of deploying learned models on robot hardware
- Strong systems-level thinking — you design for maintainability, observability, and failure modes, not just peak performance
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to drive technical decisions across cross-functional teams
Skills Required
- MS or PhD in Robotics, Computer Science or a related field
- Demonstrated track record of shipping AI-powered systems to production
- Deep subject matter expertise in diffusion models applied to robot learning
- Strong command of optimal control theory and practice
- Hands-on experience with hardware integration
- Proficiency in Python and C++
- Experience with real-time systems constraints
- Excellent communication skills
- Willing to work in the office from Charlestown, MA
What We Do
We believe the best working experience is one where machines do the heavy lifting and people do the problem solving. Our robots work with people in the messy world of warehouse loading docks, reducing the real physical pain of unloading trucks and containers radically amplifying what each person can accomplish. Founded by an exceptional cast of robotics and machine learning experts, Pickle creates robots that work alongside people in the very messy world of the loading dock, reducing the backbreaking human effort that goes into getting your online orders to your door.
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