Director - AI Research

Job Description

About the AI Technology Innovation Centre

We are establishing a world class AI research center called “AI Technology Innovation Center” (TIC) in Bengaluru. The TIC will drive research in frontier AI technology with top AI talent and having state-of-the-art infrastructure. The research breakthrough will lead to commercialize of next generation AI solutions. The AI TIC is being strategically designed to establish a globally recognized leader in AI research and development, driving innovation and setting industry benchmarks. The TIC aims to attract, nurture, and retain top-tier AI talent in India by fostering a dynamic, inclusive, and high-impact work environment that encourages continuous learning and breakthrough thinking.

The Role Mandate

As the Head of AI TIC, you will define the AI vision, lead state-of-the-art research, and scale enterprise-grade AI products from concept to global deployment. This is a high-impact leadership mandate for a visionary who thrives on building from scratch, scaling teams, and delivering AI solutions that transform industries. You will have full autonomy to shape the roadmap, architect the ecosystem, and position the organization as a global leader in AI innovation. Build the TIC from the ground up: define the AI vision, set the research and product agenda, recruit a world-class team and carry breakthrough work from published research to production-grade products. This is a founder-grade leadership mandate with authority across roadmap, organisational design, research culture, partnerships, intellectual property and technology transfer.

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Why This Role - What You Gain

• A blank canvas at frontier scale

Define the charter, culture and technical direction of a new research institution from day one.

• Global platform and visibility

Build partnerships, represent the Centre and create a recognised Bengaluru research brand.

• Ownership of a differentiated thesis

Lead empathetic, situational and self-learning AI designed for on-premise operation.

• Research-to-product authority

Own the connected outcomes of publications, patents, productisation and adoption.

Key Responsibilities - Strategy and Organisation

• Define the multi-year research and product roadmap, investment priorities, governance and operating model.

• Own organisational design, recruitment, performance, capability building, succession and resource planning.

• Set scientific, engineering, publication, patenting and productisation quality bars.

• Serve as the senior scientific and organisational representative in customer and executive reviews.

Key Responsibilities

• Research, Architecture and Scale

• Sponsor frontier research and ensure rigorous experimentation, evaluation and reproducibility.

• Establish on-premise and edge-first architecture, hybrid MLOps/LLMOps and secure enterprise integration.

• Create research-to-engineering hand-offs and measurable technology-transfer gates.

• Build alliances with universities, research labs, start-ups and industry partners.

How the Centre Works

The TIC follows a research-to-product operating model. Scientists and engineers work as one team across hypothesis formation, algorithm design, model development, evaluation, platform engineering and technology transfer. Every role combines technical depth with ownership, reproducibility, responsible AI and clear communication of outcomes.

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Qualifications and Experience:

Experience and leadership

• 12-15+ years in AI research, technology, R&D leadership.

• Strategic leadership and organisational management of multidisciplinary teams.

• Track record building or scaling an AI research centre, COE or innovation unit.

• Proven research commercialisation and enterprise-grade product delivery.

• Master’s or PhD in Computer Science, AI or a related field

Technical and research depth

• Deep expertise in LLMs architecture, multimodal AI, NLP, agentic systems, computer vision and agents.

• Strong grasp of efficient models, on-premise/edge inference and MLOps/LLMOps.

• Top-tier publications and patents with research or commercial relevance are strongly valued.

• Executive presence and credibility with customers, boards and the research community.

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What Success Looks Like (18-24 Months)

• Deliver groundbreaking research in AGI, Agentic AI, memory architecture, persona vector, emotional empathy, AI supply chain security, on-premise system prototypes

• Publish research papers in top AI conferences (NeurIPS, CVPR, etc.)

• Successful filing of research patents

• Establishing AI research institute with culture of scientific mindset, innovation, teamwork, pride.

• The 30-person TIC is staffed and operating with scientific rigour, velocity and collaboration.

• The centre earns external recognition and internal confidence through measurable product impact.

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