Director of Machine Learning, Wake Word

SoundHound Inc. builds voice AI products that make it easier for people to engage with the world around them. We do this by creating custom voice assistants that make it possible for companies to extend their brand in new and meaningful ways. Today, our customized voice AI solutions allow people to talk to phones, cars, smart speakers, mobile apps, coffee machines, and every other part of the emerging 'voice-first' world.

We are hiring a Director of Machine Learning to lead our Wake Word team. As a team, we train and deliver wake phrase models to partners, research and develop improved wake phrase technology and training techniques. Our research and development (R&D) efforts play a critical role in the success of Houndify, our voice AI platform.

You will have an opportunity to combine your management background and deep knowledge of ML and Software Engineering in a product-driven research environment. You will lead and mentor a team spread across North America and Europe, with a center of mass in the Bay Area of California. You will work closely with other R&D team directors to understand current and future efforts that will affect research decisions.

In this role you will:

• Lead the Wake Word team to achieve the team mission and individual career goals of teammates
• Grow the team by interviewing and hiring new talent, as we continue to scale
• Own Wake Word roadmap and be able to define, prioritize, and execute based on input from a variety of stakeholders
• Set the research direction for the team and actively research topics in the area of Wake Word and Keyword Spotting technology
• Evaluate and prioritize projects that require deep learning and software engineer to solve

We would love to hear from you if:

• You currently lead an R&D team in an industry setting
• You are well-versed in state-of-the-art deep learning and Speech Recognition techniques
• You are excited about the future of voice AI
• You enjoy building a team and providing growth opportunities for team members
• You believe communication and documentation is critical to a project's success
• You are self motivated, collaborative, and hands on

We'd be especially excited if you have managed R&D efforts in the field of speech recognition, speaker recognition, or keyword spotting. Ideally, you have experience in testing and deploying models to a production environment. You also have experience building and leading a team of software engineers and machine learning engineers.

Here at SoundHound, diversity, equity, and inclusion are key to who we are as a company. With a mission to build Voice AI for the world, creating a team with global perspectives is critical to our success.

We care deeply about fostering an environment where everyone is supported and can do their best work. SoundHound will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodations to participate in the interview process, perform essential job functions, and receive other benefits of employment.

Employees enjoy comprehensive health care, paid time off, discounted fitness classes, and flexible working hours. Learn more about our philosophy, benefits, and culture at https://soundhound.com/careers/.

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Come join our growing team and bring your unique voice to our mission!

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