Senior ML Compiler Engineer, Neuron

AI in this role

Design, scale, and optimize machine learning compilers for AWS Trainium accelerators on the Amazon Neuron team.

pytorchjax

cpythoncompiler-designmachine-learninghardware

AWS Machine Learning accelerators are at the forefront of AWS innovation. Trainium delivers best-in-class ML training performance with the most teraflops (TFLOPS) of compute power for ML in the cloud. This is all enabled by the AWS Neuron Software Development Kit (SDK), which includes an ML compiler, the Neuron Kernel Interface (NKI) compiler, and a runtime that natively integrates into popular ML frameworks such as PyTorch and JAX.

Neuron Kernel Interface (NKI) is a bare-metal language and compiler for directly programming AWS Trainium instances. You can use NKI to develop, optimize, and run new operators directly on hardware while making full use of available compute and memory resources.

Explore NKI:
- https://awsdocs-neuron.readthedocs-hosted.com/en/latest/nki/index.html

AWS Neuron is used at scale by customers such as Epic Games, Snap, Airbnb, Autodesk, Amazon Alexa, and Amazon Rekognition, along with many others across a range of segments.

Amazon's Annapurna Labs is responsible for building innovative silicon and software for AWS customers. We are at the forefront of innovation, combining cloud scale with the world's most talented engineers. Our team covers multiple disciplines including silicon engineering, hardware design and verification, software, and operations. With such breadth of talent, there is opportunity to learn all the time. We operate in spaces that are very large, yet our teams remain small and agile. There is no blueprint. We're inventing. We're experimenting. When you couple that with the ability to work on so many different products and services, it makes for a unique learning culture.

Learn more about our history:
- https://www.amazon.science/how-silicon-innovation-became-the-secret-sauce-behind-awss-success

Explore the Product:
- https://aws.amazon.com/machine-learning/neuron/
- https://awsdocs-neuron.readthedocs-hosted.com/en/latest/general/nki/index.html

As a Sr. ML Compiler Engineer on the Amazon Neuron team, you are a thought leader supporting the ground-up development and scaling of a compiler to handle the world's largest ML workloads. Architecting and implementing customer-critical features, publishing research, and mentoring a skilled team of engineers are exciting challenges for you. You leverage your technical communications skill as a hands-on partner to Amazon ML partner teams. You want to be involved in pre-silicon design, bringing new products and features to market, and shipping high-quality code.

A background in Machine Learning and AI accelerators is helpful, but not required.

In order to be considered for this role, candidates must be located in or willing to relocate to Seattle or Cupertino.

Key job responsibilities
- Design and build compiler features for the Neuron compilers. Your work may span the frontend, intermediate representations, optimization passes, and code generation for the hardware.
- Own customer-critical features end to end: scope the problem, write the design, ship production code, and provide support to customers.
- Partner with Amazon ML teams (PyTorch, JAX, and internal model teams) as a hands-on technical contact. You translate their workloads into compiler requirements and unblock them on hardware.
- Contribute to pre-silicon design. You give the hardware teams compiler and programmability feedback before a chip is built, and you bring new products and features to customers.
- Raise the technical bar by reviewing code and designs, publishing research where it makes sense, and mentoring engineers.

A day in the life
You start the day reviewing a teammate's code for a new compiler feature, leaving feedback before it merges. Mid-morning, you pair with a model team blocked on a kernel that hasn't reached peak performance on Trainium, and you trace the bottleneck through the compiler's passes. After lunch, you write and test the feature you scoped last week, then run your changes on hardware to confirm correctness. You close the day in a pre-silicon review, giving the hardware team programmability feedback on the next chip. The team moves quickly and you are always in the details.

Basic qualifications

- 5+ years of non-internship professional software development experience
- 5+ years of programming with at least one software programming language experience
- 5+ years of leading design or architecture (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
- Experience as a mentor, tech lead or leading an engineering team

Preferred qualifications

- 5+ years of full software development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, build processes, testing, and operations experience
- Master's degree or Ph.D. in computer science, computer engineering, or related field

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.

USA, CA, Cupertino - 193,300.00 - 261,500.00 USD annually
USA, WA, Seattle - 168,100.00 - 227,400.00 USD annually

How we rate this

Senior ML Compiler Engineer, Neuron at Amazon rates 90 out of 100 for how much of the daily work is AI. That makes it Builds AI (AI Level 4 of 4). The level is about AI in the job, not seniority.

Classification

Builds AI. The job is building AI systems.

●●●● Builds AI80 to 100
●●●○ Works on AI60 to 79
●●○○ Uses AI40 to 59
●○○○ Little AI0 to 39

Levels come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Open the description and count.

Prepare for this job

A free preview built only from this posting: what it asks for, what you could be asked in an interview, and how to adjust your resume.

Skills and AI tools this role asks for

CPythonCompiler DesignMachine LearningHardwarePyTorchJax

Questions you could be asked

Tell me about a project where c was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where python was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where compiler design was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where machine learning was part of your work. What did you do?
Tell me about a project where hardware was part of your work. What did you do?

Adapt your resume

List these exact terms on your resume: C, Python, Compiler Design, Machine Learning, and Hardware. An applicant tracking system matches the wording, not the idea.
Attach one line of real, concrete experience to at least one of them — a tool named with nothing behind it rarely survives a human read.
Lead with what you built, trained or shipped — this role is judged on the AI system itself, not the tools around it.

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