Forward Deployed Robotics Engineer

Black Forest Labs seeks a Senior Forward Deployed Robotics Engineer in Freiburg, CH, to integrate generative AI models into robotics systems for customers.

This high-ownership role focuses on deploying generative models for robotics and physical-AI clients. The engineer will embed with customers to deliver real-world integrations on their robotic systems.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate with clients to design, fine-tune, and deploy interfaces and integrations built on BFL's models.
• Ensure models perform reliably in customer environments, optimizing for latency and output quality on physical robots.
• Prototype new techniques from recent research alongside the internal research team.
• Identify and lead initiatives to expand BFL's technology into new application areas.
• Discover high-impact use cases with clients and rapidly build prototype solutions.

Requirements

• Demonstrated background as a robotics engineer, forward deployed engineer, or technical founder.
• Direct experience working with clients to iterate on solutions and provide customized support for deploying generative AI models.
• Practical experience with action or VLA models, including imitation/reinforcement learning or policy learning within the open ecosystem.
• Versatility to tackle diverse engineering challenges, spanning model hosting, backend development, and frontend UI creation.
• Strong communication abilities and experience collaborating with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with diffusion models or flow matching, along with fine-tuning and distillation methods.
• Experience optimizing inference for transformer-based machine learning models.
• Proven capability to design solutions within complex enterprise settings.
• Contributions to open-source projects, especially in diffusion models, robotics, or simulation.
• Experience using cloud platforms and modern deployment solutions.

What the company offers

• Reimbursement for reasonable travel expenses to facilitate in-person collaboration.
• Equity included in the compensation package.

About the company

Black Forest Labs operates as a distributed team with physical offices that employees actively use. As a frontier research lab, the company prioritizes deep understanding and the creation of elegant products. The culture emphasizes low ego, where the best ideas prevail and credit is shared. The team is bold, shipping work without waiting for perfect conditions, and treats colleagues with genuine warmth while prioritizing people over politics.

• Distributed team structure with actively used physical offices.
• Focus on deep understanding and beautiful product development.
• Low ego culture where the best idea wins and credit is shared.
• Bold approach to shipping without waiting for perfect conditions.
• Genuine warmth and prioritization of people over politics.