GPU Kernel Engineer
- Salary
- $190K - $250K
- Level
- Senior
- Work type
- Hybrid · San Francisco
Not stated in the posting: visa.
Open. First seen 2 October 2026.
About the role
Sciforium is an AI infrastructure company developing next-generation multimodal AI models and a proprietary, high-efficiency serving platform. Backed by multi-million-dollar funding and direct sponsorship from AMD with hands-on support from AMD engineers the team is scaling rapidly to build the full stack powering frontier AI models and real-time applications.
About the role
We are seeking a highly skilled GPU Kernel Engineer who is passionate about pushing the limits of performance on modern accelerators. In this role, you will design and optimize custom GPU kernels that power next-generation large-scale AI systems. You will work across the hardware–software stack, from low-level kernel development to integrating optimized ops into high-level ML frameworks used for large-scale training and inference.
This role is ideal for someone who thrives at the intersection of GPU programming, systems engineering, and cutting-edge AI workloads, and who wants to make meaningful contributions to the efficiency and scalability of our ML platform.
Key Responsibilities
- Design, implement, and optimize custom GPU kernels using C++, PTX, CUDA, ROCm, Triton, and/or JAX Pallas.
- Profile and optimize end-to-end performance of ML operations, with a focus on large-scale LLM training and inference.
- Integrate low-level GPU kernels into frameworks such as PyTorch, JAX, and custom internal runtimes.
- Develop performance models, identify bottlenecks, and deliver kernel-level improvements that significantly accelerate AI workloads.
- Collaborate with ML researchers, distributed systems engineers, and model-serving teams to optimize compute performance across the stack.
- Work closely with hardware vendors (NVIDIA/AMD) and stay current on the latest GPU architecture capabilities and compiler/toolchain improvements.
- Contribute to tooling, documentation, benchmarking suites, and testing frameworks to ensure correctness and performance reproducibility.
Must-Haves
- 5+ years of industry or research experience in GPU kernel development or high-performance computing.
- Bachelor’s, Master’s, or PhD in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or a related field.
- Strong programming skills in C++, Python, and familiarity with ML frameworks.
- Deep expertise in CUDA/ROCm, GPU memory models, and performance optimization strategies.
- Hands-on experience with Triton and/or JAX Pallas for custom kernel development.
- Strong understanding of PTX, GPU ASM, and low-level GPU execution.
- Extensive experience writing and optimizing custom GPU kernels in C++ and PTX.
- Proven ability to integrate low-level kernels into PyTorch, JAX, or similar frameworks.
- Experience working with large-scale LLM workloads (training or inference).
Nice-to-Haves
- Experience with AMD GPUs and ROCm optimization.
- Familiarity with JAX FFI and custom ML operator development.
- Experience with efficient model serving frameworks (e.g., vLLM, TensorRT).
- Experience with TPUs, XLA, or similar accelerator programming environments.
- Contributions to open-source ML systems, compilers, or GPU kernels.
Benefits include
- Medical, dental, and vision insurance
- 401k plan
- Daily lunch, snacks, and beverages
- Flexible time off
- Competitive salary and equity
Sciforium's standard text
Equal opportunity
Sciforium is an equal opportunity employer. All applicants will be considered for employment without attention to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran or disability status.
What this role asks for
In most of Sciforium's ads
LLM · Machine Learning · Python
Named in most of its open postings, whatever the role.
93% of this description is written for the role. The rest is Sciforium's standard text, folded away below.
Read against Sciforium's other open postings on this site.
The team: Engineering HIRES STEADILY
This role is one of 12 open in Engineering. 3 were posted in the last 30 days and the oldest in November: a team that hires all year rather than one being built.
WHAT THE TEAM WORKS WITH, ACROSS ITS POSTINGS
Python (10 of 12), LLM (8 of 12), Machine Learning (8 of 12), CUDA (6 of 12), C++ (5 of 12), Kubernetes (5 of 12), PyTorch (5 of 12)
OTHER ROLES ON THIS TEAM
- Senior HPC & GPU Infrastructure Engineer posted Oct 6
- Foundation Model Data Engineer posted Sep 28
- Pre-training Research Engineer posted Aug 31
- Research Engineer - Model Evaluation & MLOps posted Aug 31
- Distributed Training and Inference Engineer posted Aug 24
- Lead Software Engineer, Model Serving Platform posted Aug 17
- Software Engineer, Fullstack posted Aug 7
- GPU Cluster Engineer, Networking posted Aug 6
- GPU Cluster Engineer, Systems & Platform posted Aug 6
- GPU Cluster Engineer, Hardware Operations posted Jul 8
- Senior AI Serving Engineer, Backend posted Nov 15
From the team and dates on Sciforium's own job board.
Posting history
Reposted once since 2 October 2026: a posting for this role in San Francisco, CA was taken down and the role was posted again.
- 8 October 2026 – closed 12 October 2026
- 2 October 2026 – closed 3 October 2026
- 2 October 2026 – open (this posting)
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