Director of Research

Director of Research

Company

Orcrist builds the Orcrist Intelligence Platform (OIP), a Kubernetes-based data intelligence system delivered as SaaS or self-hosted/on-prem (including air-gapped deployments). We run streaming and batch pipelines that power search, ML enrichment, and investigative workflows for mission-critical customers.

Role

You will define the research agenda, build a high-calibre team, shape public research bids and industry consortia, and turn novel methods into validated assets that product and innovation teams can adopt. This is a player-coach role: early on you will stay technically hands-on while building the team and external network.

What you'll do

• Define and own the company research strategy aligned with product priorities and multi-team technical leverage.
• Build and lead a world-class research team of AI researchers, data scientists, and research engineers.
• Lead first-principles research in domains such as ASR, translation, information extraction, multimodal reasoning, visual pattern recognition, graph/temporal reasoning, and statistical analysis.
• Build the external R&D pipeline: identify opportunities, shape bids, build consortia, author work packages, and act as scientific/technical lead in awarded projects.
• Establish research operating discipline: reproducibility standards, benchmark suites, experiment tracking, model/data documentation, and portfolio reviews.
• Drive transfer into delivery teams by producing adoption-ready research packages, not just prototypes or papers.
• Represent Orcrist externally across customers, partners, universities, RTOs, industry associations, and public funding bodies.
• Shape IP and dissemination strategy for research outputs together with leadership and legal stakeholders.
• Partner closely with Innovation, Insights, Foundation, Platform, and customer-facing teams.
• Coach senior researchers and raise the bar for technical writing, scientific judgment, and cross-functional influence.

About You

• 8+ years in applied AI/ML research, data science, or equivalent deep-technical R&D roles.
• 3+ years leading research programmes, senior researchers, or cross-functional R&D initiatives.
• Deep expertise in machine learning / AI research with strong mathematical and statistical foundations.
• Expert Python; strong command of PyTorch and CUDA-backed model development.
• Experience with distributed training / research infrastructure (e.g. Ray, Horovod, multi-GPU workflows).
• Strong grounding in evaluation design, error analysis, benchmark construction, and reproducible experimentation.
• Comfort moving between research and applied systems concerns, including inference constraints and deployment trade-offs.
• Experience across one or more of: NLP, speech/audio, translation, CV, multimodal systems, knowledge graphs, temporal reasoning, or applied statistics on structured data.
• Track record of original research that produced practical impact: shipped capabilities, patents, influential prototypes, or externally recognised outputs.
• Proven experience winning or materially shaping collaborative R&D proposals, grants, tenders, or consortia.
• Strong technical writing: research memos, proposals, work packages, and external-facing technical narratives.
• Player-coach mentality: high standards, low ego, hands-on when needed.
• Eligible to work in Germany.
• German language (C1+) and comfort working in German/EU public-sector environments.

Nice-to-haves

• Publications, patents, open-source contributions, or recognised external technical profile.
• Experience with EU/public R&D programmes such as EDF, Horizon Europe, DIANA, EUDIS, or similar ecosystems.
• Experience in defence, law enforcement, geospatial, or intelligence-adjacent domains.
• Familiarity with research-to-production ML systems (e.g. Triton, KServe, MLflow).
• Existing network across universities, RTOs, primes, SMEs, or European innovation bodies.

What We Offer

• Build the research function behind a sovereign European intelligence platform.
• Unique mix of original research, real-world adoption, and public-interest impact.
• Opportunity to shape both technical differentiation and external funding strategy.
• Remote-first in Germany with occasional team events in Berlin.
• Home office budget and great equipment.
• 30 days vacation.