AI Researcher - Efficient AI (Contractor) at LG Electronics
Santa Clara, CA
$174,720–$189,280
Jul 25, 2026
Santa Clara, CA
Jul 26, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A one-year contract research role focused on making large and multimodal AI models faster, smaller, and more practical to deploy on constrained hardware such as edge devices, AI PCs, and vehicle systems. Day-to-day work spans model compression, quantization, efficient inference, and emerging architectures, with output ranging from experimental prototypes and benchmark evaluations to potential publications and patent filings. Best suited to someone with a graduate-level ML background who can move fluidly between reading recent literature and writing working code.
Senior level · San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA · Master's required · Contract
Pay in the description: $84.13–$91.34/hr
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 100 people in the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (data scientists). range 20–150
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $189,150 (middle half $152,859–$224,286). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (7)
This role sits at the boundary between ML research (15-2051 Data Scientists) and software/systems engineering (15-1252 Software Developers). The primary framing is AI research — publications, novel methods, benchmarks — but the role also requires hands-on implementation and prototype engineering, making 15-1252 a credible alternative.
Degree requirement: the JD states 'M.S. or Ph.D.' as the minimum; a Bachelor's is not listed as acceptable, so Masters is set as the floor. Post-graduate industry experience is noted as preferred but not required.
The compensation range ($84.13–$91.34) is listed per the 'Recruiting Range' section with no explicit 'per hour' label, but the contract nature and the magnitude of the figures strongly imply an hourly rate. The period is set to Hour accordingly; if this is actually an annual figure it would be unusually low for the market.
The 'Ways to Stand Out' section is treated as preferred/nice-to-have throughout. Specific inference frameworks (llama.cpp, vLLM, SGLang, TensorRT-LLM), post-training methods (PTQ, QAT, LoRA, distillation, DPO), and emerging architectures (MoE, SSMs) all appear exclusively there.
This is explicitly a one-year contract with potential for extension; employment type is set to Contract.
The role is hybrid (Santa Clara, CA); remote is set to false.
Posting is for a contract engagement — the market benchmarks below price full-time roles, so read the comp comparison with that in mind.
Read the full posting
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