We build foundational world models that can perceive, generate, reason, and interact with the 3D world — unlocking AI's full potential through spatial intelligence by transforming seeing into doing, perceiving into reasoning, and imagining into creating.
We believe spatial intelligence will unlock new forms of storytelling, creativity, design, simulation, and immersive experiences across both virtual and physical worlds.
We bring together a world-class team, united by a shared curiosity, passion, and deep backgrounds in technology — from AI research to systems engineering to product design — creating a tight feedback loop between our cutting-edge research and products that empower our users.
Role OverviewWe are building a production-grade web application for 3D Gaussian Splat scene generation, editing, and publishing, and we’re looking for a Pipeline Engineer to help integrate cutting-edge research features and make them reliable, debuggable, and delightful to use.
This is a high-ownership, fullstack-but-backend-heavy role that sits between R&D and frontend. You will work end-to-end across graphics/ML algorithms, backend services, and frontend UI — turning proof-of-concepts into shipped features that users can rely on. The ideal candidate enjoys making complex, messy systems work smoothly in production and improving them continuously based on both internal testing and external user feedback.
Key Responsibilities- Bridge research and product by working closely with both graphics/computer vision researchers and frontend engineers to ship usable features.
- Turn standalone Python scripts into clean, production-ready systems with clear inputs, outputs, validations, and failure modes.
- Develop backend services, APIs, and tooling that expose complex 3D workflows in a reliable and scalable way.
- Assist in integrations across the 3D ecosystem, including asset import/export and format conversion with common DCC tools.
- You have a strong pipeline mindset, with experience turning scripts into production systems with clear inputs, outputs, validations, and failure modes.
- You enjoy building tools and infrastructure that enable others, and you take pride in making complex systems understandable and usable.
- You have fluency in the 3D ecosystem, including familiarity with 3D algorithms, DCC tools and common 3D file formats, sufficient to design integrations and debug workflow issues.
- Strong proficiency in Python, including packaging, typing, tooling, debugging, and performance profiling.
- Strong literacy in core 3D graphics and computer vision concepts, such as transforms, cameras, coordinate systems, rendering, and visual artifact debugging.
- Demonstrated experience taking prototypes to production, including refactoring, testing, CI/CD, versioned artifacts, and reproducibility.
- Solid backend fundamentals, including HTTP APIs, FastAPI (or similar frameworks), async/concurrency basics, cloud deployment, and service reliability.
- Experience with photogrammetry, 3D reconstruction, or Gaussian splat rendering pipelines.
- Hands-on experience with DCC tools such as Blender, Maya, Houdini, Unreal, or Unity.
- Familiarity with the GPU stack (CUDA, PyTorch), batch/queue systems, and containerization (Docker, Kubernetes).
- Frontend adjacency, with comfort collaborating on React-based parameter plumbing and UX for technical controls.
- Experience with production pipelines at VFX, animation, or gaming studios.
- A production support mindset, including willingness to iterate on documentation, tutorials, and error messages to improve usability and reduce misuse.
- Packaging ML and 3D Python pipelines into GPU-backed FastAPI services with request validation, reproducible outputs, and well-defined request/response schemas.
- Designing parameter schemas and defaults that map cleanly from frontend controls to backend APIs and internal pipeline configurations.
- Integrating import/export workflows with popular DCC tools (e.g., Blender, Maya, Houdini, Unity, Unreal, USD), identifying workflow friction, and producing lightweight documentation, tutorials, and example code/scripts to help users succeed.
- Fearless Innovator: We need people who thrive on challenges and aren't afraid to tackle the impossible.
- Resilient Builder: Impacting Large World Models isn't a sprint; it's a marathon with hurdles. We're looking for builders who can weather the storms of groundbreaking research and come out stronger.
- Mission-Driven Mindset: Everything we do is in service of creating the best spatially intelligent AI systems, and using them to empower people.
- Collaborative Spirit: We're building something bigger than any one person. We need team players who can harness the power of collective intelligence.
We're hiring the brightest minds from around the globe to bring diverse perspectives to our cutting-edge work. If you're ready to work on technology that will reshape how machines perceive and interact with the world - then World Labs is your launchpad.
Join us, and let's make history together.
Equal Employment Opportunity
World Labs is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected under applicable law. We welcome all qualified applicants and are committed to providing reasonable accommodations throughout the hiring process upon request.
California Pay Transparency
In accordance with California law, we disclose the following:
Pay Range
$200-$325 base salary (good-faith estimate for San Francisco Bay Area upon hire; actual offer based on experience, skills, and qualifications)
Total Compensation
Base salary plus equity awards and annual performance bonus
Salary History
We do not request or consider prior compensation in making offers
Compliance: Cal. Lab. Code §432.3 (pay scale disclosure & salary history ban); Cal. Lab. Code §1197.5 (Equal Pay Act); Cal. Gov. Code §12940 (FEHA); 42 U.S.C. §2000e (Title VII); 29 U.S.C. §621 (ADEA); 42 U.S.C. §12101 (ADA)
Accommodations & inquiries: [email protected]
Top Skills
What We Do
World Labs is a spatial intelligence company building Large World Models (LWMs) to perceive, generate, and interact with the 3D world. We aim to lift AI models from the 2D plane of pixels to full 3D worlds – both virtual and real – endowing them with spatial intelligence as rich as our own. We believe that humans are innovative, curious, and creative; science and technology are both manifestations and drivers of these impulses. Propelling AI forward with spatial intelligence will also propel forward both individuals and humanity as a whole. Toward this goal, World Labs will develop spatially intelligent LWMs that can understand and reason about the 3D world from images and other modalities. Over time, we expect to train increasingly powerful models with broader capabilities that can be applied in a variety of domains, working alongside people. These are ambitious goals, so we are building an ambitious company to tackle them. Our team, led by co-founders Fei-Fei Li, PhD; Justin Johnson, PhD; Christoph Lassner, PhD; and Ben Mildenhall, PhD, has a strong research background, but we are not motivated by exploration for its own sake. Instead, we believe that now is a unique moment where rapid scientific progress has thinned the barrier between research and applications. We aim to seize this opportunity, focusing on the entire throughline from research to engineering to product to people. We are bringing together the most formidable slate of pixel talent ever assembled, creating a tight feedback loop between our spatially intelligent foundation models and products that will empower our users. We invite you to learn more about joining our fast-growing team. You can find open positions at jobs.ashbyhq.com/worldlabs.
