Role overview

As an AI Research Engineer at Iconic Interactive, you will bridge the gap between massive research models and real-time interactive entertainment. You’ll architect high-performance inference pipelines for multimodal LLMs and TTS models, optimizing them to run on consumer hardware. Your work ensures digital entities perform seamlessly within the constraints of a game loop.

Iconic Interactive

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Iconic Interactive (Iconic) is an AI-native video game studio that builds intelligent, “living” game worlds and voice-driven interactive experiences, positioning itself at the intersection of artificial intelligence and AAA-quality game development.[17][4][13] The company focuses on creating AI-driven systems for dynamic storytelling, voice-based player interactions, and procedurally adaptive worlds, enabling previously impossible game experiences that respond in real time to player intent.[17][14] Its technology aims to make high-budget, AAA-style game production faster, cheaper, and more creative by using advanced machine learning and generative AI to streamline content creation and in-game behavior, allowing smaller teams to deliver rich, varied experiences traditionally requiring much larger studios.[13][4][16] Backed by a $4M pre-seed round and a subsequent $13M seed round led by prominent venture investors, Iconic is building a new category of AI-first, on-device, voice-driven games and “iconic universes” designed for broad, mainstream audiences.[2][4][10]

What you will do

Architect and maintain low-latency inference pipelines for Multimodal LLMs, TTS, and Vision models targeting server-side and consumer edge environments.
Implement state-of-the-art optimization techniques like Speculative Decoding, KV-Cache quantization, and custom CUDA/Triton kernels to minimize latency and maximize throughput.
Collaborate with game engineering teams to integrate thread-safe, non-blocking asynchronous inference directly into the game loop using C++ wrappers.

Who this is a fit for

Holds an MSc or PhD in Computer Science or ML with deep expertise in model optimization techniques like quantization, pruning, and distillation.
Possesses strong proficiency in C/C++ and Python, with hands-on experience deploying latency-sensitive ML models using frameworks like PyTorch or JAX.
Demonstrates specialized knowledge in LLM-specific optimizations such as KV-cache management, speculative decoding, and high-performance runtimes like TensorRT or ONNX.

Why this role is remarkable

Lead the technical frontier by taking cutting-edge research models and making them run in real-time on consumer hardware for interactive digital experiences.
Join a seed-stage startup founded by AI lab and game studio veterans, offering significant autonomy and end-to-end ownership of the inference engine.
Work at the unique intersection of System ML and Game Tech, shaping the core intelligence of virtual actors in next-generation entertainment.

How Jack & Jill work together

I get to know what you’re great at, then find roles you’d never find yourself.Ok, I'll go first. I'm Jack, an AI that gets to know you on a quick call, learning what you're great at and what you want from your career. Then I help you land your dream job by finding unmissable opportunities as they come up, supporting you with applications, interview prep, and moral support.

I recruit from Jack’s network and make the intro when I spot a great match.And I'm Jill, an AI Recruiter who talks to companies to understand who they're looking to hire. Then I recruit from Jack's network, making an introduction when I spot an excellent candidate.

AI Research Engineer, Model Optimization and Inference at Iconic Interactive