Head of AI
About The Position
Cyvl is a Boston-based tech startup revolutionizing how governments map and manage transportation infrastructure. Our enterprise-grade hardware and software solutions leverage 3D mapping sensors to capture LiDAR, imagery, and GPS data, retrofitted to our customers' vehicles. This data is processed through our AI-powered cloud pipelines to generate actionable geospatial insights that save cities time, money, and resources. At Cyvl, our mission is to empower governments to build and maintain public infrastructure they're proud of. We are already accelerating decision-making nationwide through our sensors and Infrastructure Intelligence Platform. This role owns the AI/ML strategy that powers the next generation of our Intelligence Platform, translating a bold product vision into the technical roadmap, team, and systems that make it real. We're a fast-moving, high-growth team that believes in solving real-world problems with authenticity, simplicity, and boldness. Every member of our team is empowered to take ownership, deliver results, and leave a lasting impact on the communities we serve. About You You've led AI/ML teams that built production systems on complex, multi-modal data. You've set technical strategy, hired engineers, and shipped products, not just published research. You're comfortable going hands-on with code and models when needed, but your real leverage is in figuring out what to build, in what order, and hiring the right people to build it. You've worked with sensor data, geospatial data, or physical-world AI, and you understand that the hardest problems aren't model architecture problems, they're data strategy problems. You want to build the AI function that teaches machines to understand physical infrastructure at a depth and scale that has never existed.
Requirements
- 8+ years in ML/AI, with at least 3 years leading a team (hiring, managing, setting technical direction).
- Track record of shipping production ML systems on sensor data, geospatial data, or multi-modal data at scale.
- Experience setting AI/ML strategy for a product or business unit, not just executing someone else's roadmap.
- Hands-on technical depth: you can train models, design data pipelines, and evaluate architectural tradeoffs yourself.
- Experience with data-efficient learning approaches (active learning, semi-supervised methods, foundation model adaptation) in production.
- Led teams of 3+ ML/AI engineers and made successful senior technical hires.
- Strong communicator who can translate between technical AI/ML concepts and business/product strategy.
Nice To Haves
- Experience with LiDAR, point cloud data, or 3D perception.
- Background in autonomous vehicles, HD mapping, satellite imagery, or infrastructure/civil engineering domains.
- Experience building knowledge graphs or ontology-driven data architectures.
- Familiarity with geospatial databases (PostGIS, spatial indexing).
- Experience designing data architectures for agentic or LLM-driven access patterns.
- Background at Palantir, an AV company, or a geospatial intelligence organization.
- Experience at a startup or scaling an AI/ML function from zero.
Responsibilities
- Interpret Cyvl's Infrastructure Intelligence vision and translate it into a concrete AI/ML technical strategy covering perception (imagery + LiDAR), knowledge representation, and data architecture.
- Be hands-on in the early months: set up the initial ML pipelines, make key architectural decisions, and validate technical approaches before you have a team.
- Hire and lead the AI/ML team, starting with a senior ML engineer and a senior knowledge graph architect as the first two roles.
- Own the full intelligence extraction pipeline: from raw sensor data to detections, geometric measurements, cross-modal representations, and a queryable knowledge graph.
- Work directly with the CEO and engineering leadership to align AI/ML investments with product priorities and customer needs.
Benefits
- Competitive salary and equity package ($300K-$400K total comp, equity-heavy)
- Comprehensive health, dental, and vision coverage
- 401(k) with immediate vesting
- Generous PTO, paid parental leave, and flexible work options
- Annual professional development stipend
- Team events, referral bonuses, and a collaborative, growth-focused culture
- Ownership of the entire AI/ML function at a company with real data, real customers, and a clear vision
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
Education Level
No Education Listed
