Postdoctoral Fellowship - Robotics and AI
About The Position
The Ludo Robotics Research Fellows Program is a one-year, post-doctoral-level appointment for exceptional early-career researchers who want to go beyond the boundaries of traditional academic research and translate frontier ideas into physical systems deployed in the real world. Fellows will pursue independent and collaborative research in Robotics, AI and Human-Robot Interaction (HRI)—with full access to our robot platforms, datasets, compute infrastructure, and the mentorship of our core research team. This is not an internship. Fellows are expected to drive meaningful research contributions that advance the state of the art and feed directly into Ludo's technical roadmap. Business travel to our Seoul Office may be required. We welcome applicants whose work spans AI / ML, HRI, perception, manipulation, navigation, or any adjacent area where ambitious research can move the needle.
Requirements
- PhD (completed or expected by start date) in Human-Robot Interaction, Human-Computer Interaction, Robotics, Computer Science, Cognitive Science, or a closely related field.
- A strong record of research contributions demonstrated through publications, preprints, or equivalent technical output.
- Experience conducting rigorous experiments—user studies, ablations, or system evaluations—and interpreting results clearly.
- Ability to work independently and drive a research agenda with minimal supervision while remaining collaborative and communicative.
Nice To Haves
- Hands-on prototyping experience with physical robots (humanoid, mobile, or custom platforms) or virtual agents.
- Experience designing and running controlled user studies and participatory design sessions.
- Comfort working across disciplines, translating between user insights, theoretical models, and engineering constraints.
- Familiarity with ROS, Python, or related robotics software tools.
- Experience with large language models (LLMs), particularly in building conversational AI, dialog systems, or applying LLMs to robot behavior such as natural language understanding and task planning.
- Genuine curiosity about people and what makes interactions feel natural, safe, and engaging.
Responsibilities
- Design and lead an independent research agenda within the fellowship scope, in collaboration with Ludo's research team.
- Conduct experiments, user studies, and field deployments to evaluate hypotheses on real hardware.
- Develop theoretical frameworks and translate them into prototype robot behaviors that bridge research with real-world system implementation.
- Synthesize findings from academic literature across HRI, HCI, social robotics, cognitive science, robot learning, and AI to inform research direction.
- Integrate developed models and algorithms into robot control pipelines and evaluate their real-world performance.
- Collaborate cross-functionally with engineers, designers, and product teams to translate research insights into deployable systems.
- Contribute to establishing metrics and evaluation frameworks for robot behavior and system performance.
- Publicize and disseminate research findings through publications, preprints, talks, and open-source releases.
- Actively participate in team seminars, design reviews, and knowledge-sharing sessions.
Benefits
- Competitive compensation commensurate with post-doctoral research experience.
- Full access to state-of-the-art robot platforms, compute infrastructure, and real-world deployment environments.
- Direct mentorship from Ludo's founding research team and access to KRAFTON's AI Center network.
- A collaborative, fast-moving research culture that values independent thinking and high-quality work.
- Opportunity for the fellowship to convert to a full-time research role based on mutual interest and fit.
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What This Job Offers
Career Level
Entry Level
Education Level
Ph.D. or professional degree
