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Software Engineer, AI accelerator Runtime

OpenAI· Scaling
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Hybrid (San Francisco)$266k - $445k + equityFull-timePosted 2mo ago

About the role

Builds the low-level device runtime for OpenAI's custom AI accelerator, turning compiled programs into efficient execution. Works at the software-hardware boundary to schedule kernel launches, manage memory, and provide interfaces for higher-level runtimes.

Responsibilities

  • Design and implement the low-level device runtime for OpenAI custom silicon.
  • Build kernel-launch scheduling, command submission, queueing, dependency tracking, and completion handling.
  • Manage device memory spaces, allocation, virtual-to-physical mappings, data movement, and lifetime across concurrent workloads.
  • Implement synchronization primitives, events, barriers, streams, and ordering guarantees that are correct and efficient.
  • Define clean interfaces between the runtime, drivers, firmware, compiler-generated code, kernels, and higher-level execution systems.
  • Use event-based, cycle-accurate simulators to develop, validate, debug, and performance-tune runtime behavior before and after silicon availability.
  • Diagnose concurrency, memory-ordering, deadlock, race, correctness, and performance issues across software and hardware boundaries.
  • Build tests, tracing, profiling, observability, and reproducible workloads for runtime correctness and performance.
  • Partner with architecture and silicon teams to turn workload and simulator insights into hardware-software interface improvements.

Qualifications

  • Have strong low-level systems programming experience in C, C++, Rust, or comparable environments.
  • Have built runtimes, drivers, firmware, operating-system components, accelerator software, or adjacent systems infrastructure.
  • Understand concurrency, synchronization, asynchronous execution, queues, events, and memory-ordering semantics.
  • Understand memory management, address spaces, DMA, caching, coherency, and hardware-software interfaces.
  • Have hands-on experience with event-based, cycle-accurate simulators or closely related architectural and performance models.
  • Can reason quantitatively about scheduling, latency, throughput, utilization, contention, and resource tradeoffs.
  • Are skilled at debugging failures that span software abstractions, device interfaces, and hardware behavior.
  • Work effectively across compiler, kernel, architecture, verification, firmware, and silicon teams.

Benefits

  • Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts
  • Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)
  • 401(k) retirement plan with employer match
  • Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)
  • Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees
  • 13+ paid company holidays, and multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year for focus and recharge, plus paid sick or safe time
  • Mental health and wellness support
  • Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage
  • Annual learning and development stipend
  • Daily meals in our offices, and meal delivery credits as eligible
  • Relocation support for eligible employees
  • Additional taxable fringe benefits, such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends may also be provided
Last updated Aug 27, 2026. Interested? Apply on the company site.

About OpenAI

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