Research Engineer / Research Scientist, Pre-Training

Details

Anthropic’s mission is to create reliable, interpretable, and steerable AI systems. The Pre-training team in Zurich develops the next generation of large language models with a primary focus on multimodal capabilities — giving LLMs the ability to understand and interact with modalities other than text. In this role you will work at the intersection of cutting-edge research and practical engineering, contributing to the development of safe, steerable, and trustworthy AI systems.

Responsibilities

• Conduct research and implement solutions in areas such as model architecture, algorithms, data processing, and optimizer development
• Independently lead small research projects and collaborate with team members on larger initiatives
• Design, run, and analyze scientific experiments to advance understanding of large language models
• Optimize and scale training infrastructure to improve efficiency and reliability
• Develop and improve developer tooling to enhance team productivity
• Contribute across the stack, from low-level optimizations to high-level model design

Requirements

• Degree (BA required, MS or PhD preferred) in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related field
• Strong software engineering skills with a proven track record of building complex systems
• Expertise in Python and deep learning frameworks
• Experience with high-performance, large-scale ML systems, particularly for language modeling
• Familiarity with ML accelerators, Kubernetes, and large-scale data processing
• Strong problem-solving skills and a results-oriented mindset
• Excellent communication skills and ability to work collaboratively

Preferred / Nice-to-have

• Experience proposing and experimentally comparing Transformer variants and novel attention mechanisms
• Experience preparing large-scale datasets for model consumption
• Experience scaling distributed training jobs and designing fault tolerance strategies for training infrastructure
• Experience creating interactive visualizations of model internals (for example, attention patterns)

Sample Projects

• Optimizing throughput of novel attention mechanisms
• Proposing Transformer variants and experimentally comparing performance
• Preparing large-scale datasets for model consumption
• Scaling distributed training jobs to thousands of accelerators
• Designing fault tolerance strategies for training infrastructure
• Creating interactive visualizations of model internals

Compensation

Annual Salary: CHF280,000 - CHF680,000

Logistics

• Education requirements: at least a Bachelor's degree in a related field or equivalent experience
• Location-based hybrid policy: staff expected to be in one of our offices at least 25% of the time
• Visa sponsorship: Anthropic states they sponsor visas and retain an immigration lawyer to assist; sponsorship is not guaranteed for every role/candidate

About Anthropic / Culture

Anthropic works as a single cohesive team on a few large-scale research efforts, values impact and collaboration, and hosts frequent research discussions. The company emphasizes AI safety, ethics, and inclusive hiring practices. If you're excited about pushing the boundaries of AI while prioritizing safety and ethics, Anthropic encourages you to apply.