Senior ML Performance Engineer, Inference Optimisation

About the Position

Senior ML Performance Engineer, Inference Optimisation

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Location

London, United Kingdom

Employment Type

Full time

Location Type

Hybrid

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About the Position

We are looking for a Senior ML Performance Engineer, Inference Optimisation to join our AI Platform team at Wayve. Our mission is to build the leading AI platform for autonomous driving, enabling vehicles to learn directly from real-world experience.

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Responsibilities

• Profiling Inference Performance: Across model graphs, compiler/runtime behaviour, kernel execution, and memory movement.
• Implementing and Validating Optimisations: In compilers, runtimes, and/or kernels, including fusion, scheduling, quantisation-aware performance, and custom kernels.
• Building Benchmarking and Regression Tests: To track performance across models, devices, and software releases.
• Optimising for Edge Targets: Such as NVIDIA Orin/Thor and Qualcomm platforms.
• Contributing to Team Tooling, Documentation, and Technical Discussions: Around ML performance.

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Requirements

• Experience improving performance in production or production-adjacent systems with latency, memory, bandwidth, power, thermal, or cost constraints.
• Strong hands-on experience with at least one relevant stack, such as TensorRT, CUDA, Qualcomm QNN, Triton, or OpenCL.
• Comfortable working from high-level model behaviour down to kernel/runtime-level execution.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals, including debugging, profiling, testing, and maintainable code.
• Clear communication and ability to work well across ML, systems, and deployment teams.

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Nice to Have

• Experience deploying or benchmarking ML models on embedded or edge devices.
• Familiarity with NVIDIA and/or Qualcomm SoCs and performance tooling.
• Python and C++ proficiency.
• Experience supporting other engineers or contributing to technical direction within a small team.

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We Offer

• Salaries benchmarked against the market annually.
• Meaningful equity, sharing in the ownership and long-term success of Wayve.
• Relocation support and visa sponsorship where applicable.
• Hybrid working, core hours, and the chance to work hands-on in vehicle workshops and labs.
• Learning and development budgets with support for training, conferences, and growth.
• Comprehensive benefits including health insurance, dental, enhanced maternity and paternity leave, retirement or pension where applicable, access to therapists, wellbeing partnerships, team socials, and more.

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About the Company

🚀 Wayve is building the leading AI platform for autonomous driving. We are pioneering an end-to-end AI approach that enables vehicles to learn directly from real-world experience, developing the ability to adapt, generalise, and improve at scale. Instead of relying on hand-coded rules or pre-mapped environments, our AI Driver learns to drive by understanding the world around it. The result is technology that navigates complex urban environments with intelligence, precision, and natural flow, unlocking meaningful advances in both safety and efficiency.

Our ambition is to make autonomy universal. Wayve’s mapless and hardware-agnostic AI platform integrates with global OEM partners, enabling continuous software evolution and unlocking advanced levels of automation from L2 plus through to L4 as our core AI model scales. In a race increasingly defined by intelligence and real-world learning, Wayve is taking a distinct approach, building a generalisable driving intelligence that can power any vehicle, anywhere. By combining embodied AI with scalable deployment, we are creating technology that can be shaped to each OEM brand and driver experience, accelerating the transition to a safer, more intelligent future of mobility.

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How We Work

Our main hubs are in London, Sunnyvale, Yokohama, Herzliya, Vancouver, and Leonberg. We operate a hybrid working model that combines in-person collaboration in our dedicated office spaces with focused time working remotely. This gives our teams the connection and energy of working together, alongside the flexibility to do their best work in a way that fits their lives.

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The Interview Process

Our process is clear and respectful of your time:

• Initial call / recruiter screen
• HM meeting [30 mins]
• Deep-dive technical interviews [kernel optimisation, system design & domain-specific interviews; 3 hours total]
• Final interview: mission & values alignment

We’ll always explain the format and work around your availability.

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A Quick Note

Wayve is not a mature, fully-structured place with the playbook already written. Much of how we work is still being written, and if you join, you’ll help write it. That suits people who want real ownership more than people who need a settled structure from day one.

If that sounds like the kind of problem you want to spend your time on, we’d really like to hear from you.

At Wayve, we're committed to creating a diverse, fair, and respectful culture that is inclusive of everyone based on their unique skills and perspectives, and regardless of sex, race, religion or belief, ethnic or national origin, disability, age, citizenship, marital, domestic, or civil partnership status, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, pregnancy or related condition (including breastfeeding) or any other basis as protected by applicable law.

For more information, visit Careers at Wayve. To learn more about what drives us, visit Values at Wayve.

DISCLAIMER: We will not ask about marriage or pregnancy, care responsibilities, or disabilities in any of our job adverts or interviews. However, we do look to capture information about care responsibilities, and disabilities among other diversity information as part of an optional DEI Monitoring form to help us identify areas of improvement in our hiring process and ensure that the process is inclusive and non-discriminatory.