Software Engineer, Performance OptimizationRedwood City, CA

Software Engineer, Performance Optimization

Here at Fireworks, we're building the future of generative AI infrastructure. Fireworks offers the generative AI platform with the highest-quality models and the fastest, most scalable inference. We've been independently benchmarked to have the fastest LLM inference and have been getting great traction with innovative research projects, like our own function calling and multi-modal models. Fireworks is funded by top investors, like Benchmark and Sequoia, and we're an ambitious, fun team composed primarily of veterans from Pytorch and Google Vertex AI.

The Role

We're looking for a Software Engineer focused on Performance Optimization to help push the boundaries of speed and efficiency across our AI infrastructure. In this role, you'll take ownership of optimizing performance at every layer of the stackfrom low-level GPU kernels to large-scale distributed systems. A key focus will be maximizing the performance of our most demanding workloads, including large language models (LLMs), vision-language models (VLMs), and next-generation video models.

You'll work closely with teams across research, infrastructure, and systems to identify performance bottlenecks, implement cutting-edge optimizations, and scale our AI systems to meet the demands of real-world production use cases. Your work will directly impact the speed, scalability, and cost-effectiveness of some of the most advanced generative AI models in the world.

Key Responsibilities

• Optimize system and GPU performance for high-throughput AI workloads across training and inference
• Analyze and improve latency, throughput, memory usage, and compute efficiency
• Profile system performance to detect and resolve GPU- and kernel-level bottlenecks
• Implement low-level optimizations using CUDA, Triton, and other performance tooling
• Drive improvements in execution speed and resource utilization for large-scale model workloads (LLMs, VLMs, and video models)
• Collaborate with ML researchers to co-design and tune model architectures for hardware efficiency
• Improve support for mixed precision, quantization, and model graph optimization
• Build and maintain performance benchmarking and monitoring infrastructure
• Scale inference and training systems across multi-GPU, multi-node environments
• Evaluate and integrate optimizations for emerging hardware accelerators and specialized runtimes

Minimum Qualifications

Preferred Qualifications

Example Projects

Total compensation for this role also includes meaningful equity in a fast-growing startup, along with a competitive salary and comprehensive benefits package. Base salary is determined by a range of factors including individual qualifications, experience, skills, interview performance, market data, and work location. The listed salary range is intended as a guideline and may be adjusted.

Base Pay Range (Plus Equity)

$175,000 - $220,000 USD

Why Fireworks AI?

Fireworks AI is an equal-opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all innovators.