Sr Software Engineer, AI Tools – AI/ML Compiler

Qualcomm • San Diego, CA

10d • $140,800 - $211,200 • Onsite

About The Position

As a leading technology innovator, Qualcomm pushes the boundaries of what's possible to enable next-generation AI experiences and drive agentic transformation, creating a smarter, connected future for all. As a Qualcomm Machine Learning Engineer, you will develop and implement cutting-edge tools and solutions to enable state-of-the-art AI solutions across various technology verticals. All Qualcomm employees are expected to actively support diversity on their teams, and in the Company. This role is open to both San Diego, CA and Raleigh, NC and will be onsite full-time.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field and 4+ years of Software Engineering, ML Engineering, or related experience OR Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field and 3+ years of relevant experience OR PhD in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field and 2+ years of relevant experience
• 2+ years in ML systems, model optimization, or inference engineering.
• Proficient in Python in large, typed codebases.
• Strong written and verbal communication.
• Comfortable operating across compiler, research, and partner-facing teams.

Nice To Haves

• Working knowledge of graph concepts: intermediate representations, graph traversal, pass-based optimization, pattern matching, and fixed-point iteration.
• Familiarity with the ONNX format, operator semantics, and opset versioning. A strong willingness to ramp up quickly is fine if you don't have all of this yet.
• Comfortable with graph algorithms — DFS/BFS, topological sort, basic dataflow analysis.
• Exposure to ONNX Runtime, PyTorch, or another ML framework for model inspection and validation.
• A working sense of model quantization is a plus.
• Strong written and verbal communication. Comfortable asking questions, seeking feedback, and learning quickly from code review.
• Experience using agentic coding tools such as GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Claude Code, Codeium, or similar AI-assisted development tools to improve coding productivity and problem-solving.

Responsibilities

• Implement new ONNX graph optimization passes under technical guidance from senior engineers. Work spans pattern matching, dead code elimination, op fusion, reshape/transpose simplification, and layout transforms.
• Extend existing passes to handle new operator patterns, edge cases, and opset variations.
• Write rewrites that follow established compiler engineering practices for clarity, modularity, and testability.
• Write match logic that identifies specific subgraph shapes. This means inspecting op types, attributes, tensor shapes, and producer chains.
• Implement rewrites that transform matched patterns. The rewrites need to preserve graph correctness and any metadata that downstream stages depend on, such as quantization information.
• Reuse existing graph traversal and rewriting utilities rather than reimplementing common operations.
• Write unit tests that exercise new passes against synthetic and real ONNX models. Use IR-level diff checks to confirm transformations produce the expected graph.
• Validate transformations end-to-end using ONNX Runtime. Compare numerical outputs of the pre- and post-optimized models against tolerance thresholds.
• Maintain and extend test fixtures as optimization coverage grows.
• Work closely with engineers on the optimizer team to ramp up on the codebase. Learn how compiler-style optimizations are designed and reviewed in production.
• Coordinate with quantization and model preparation engineers. Understand how optimizer output flows into the rest of the deployment pipeline.

Benefits

• competitive annual discretionary bonus program
• opportunity for annual RSU grants
• highly competitive benefits package is designed to support your success at work, at home, and at play

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior