Research Program Leader

At Bose Corporation, we believe sound is the most powerful force on earth — and for over 60 years, we have been a company built on innovation, excellence, and independence. Privately owned, fiercely customer-focused, and driven by our values, we continue to lead industries and transform lives through sound. Today, Bose Corporation is entering an exciting new era. Across multiple global Business Units and Global Functions, we are shaping the future of audio technology, automotive, luxury, and premium experiences. We invite you to join us in this transformation. Job DescriptionResearch Program LeaderRole SummaryResearch Program Leaders are senior scientific and technical leaders, responsible for the long-term direction, health, and output of one of Bose’s core research portfolios. These programs will build on Bose’s foundation in sound and audio and extend them toward systems at the intelligent edge.Bose Research is organizing around durable capability domains in perceptual intelligence, environmental adaptation and sensing, distributed edge orchestration, and trusted intelligent systems. These domains will serve as the long-horizon scientific engines that power future technologies, platforms, products, middleware, and new businesses.In this model, the Research Program Leaders sit at the intersection of deep technical research, systems strategy, team formation, and business relevance. They partner closely with research leadership, corporate strategy, and engineering teams to ensure that long-horizon science creates durable capability platforms.This search is not simply for a leader to execute a predefined agenda. It is also an invitation to propose what Bose should pursue next. We are looking for visionary, hands-on leaders who can articulate a compelling research thesis, shape it into an ambitious and focused program, assemble and align a multidisciplinary team, and carry the work from foundational research through prototypes, demonstrations, and pathways to meaningful product and business impact. Candidates should be prepared to describe not only what they have led in the past, but also the opportunity they believe Bose should pursue, why it matters, where Bose can create a distinctive advantage, and how they would build and execute the program.We are particularly interested in research programs spanning three interconnected areas: multimodal human perception, including the creation of perceptually coherent scenes and interactions across sound, vision, touch, motion, and context; intelligent environments that sense people and adapt to their needs in useful, intuitive, and trustworthy ways; and distributed architectures that intelligently place computation across wearable devices, nearby or local resources, and the cloud to optimize responsiveness, energy use, capability, privacy, resilience, and overall experience. The strongest proposals may connect these domains and establish a durable new technical franchise for Bose.This role begins with sound and audio as Bose’s foundation, but it does not stop there. Each leader is expected to help build outward from audio into multimodal, distributed, and trusted systems at the intelligent edge.This role is responsible for:• defining and evolving the research program vision, boundaries, and 10-year science arcs• attracting, developing, and leading a world-class research team and network of external partners• shaping 12 to 36-month research programs that generate deployable models, datasets, evaluation frameworks, APIs, and foundational IP• ensuring franchise work connects sound and audio use cases to broader intelligent edge system opportunities• mapping research outputs into products, platform capabilities, middleware, licensable IP, strategic pilots, and future venture opportunitiesResearch DomainsWe expect research programs will anchor in one of these domains, but every role is expected to think across the full Bose Research stack.Research Franchise: Perceptual Intelligence Systems-Perceptual models and decision logic that make adaptive experiences feel human, stable, and personalized across devices and environments.Environmental Adaptation & Sensing Systems-Model room, cabin, motion, listener, and contextual state in real time so systems can infer and adapt to the physical world.Distributed Edge Orchestration-Coordinate inference, rendering, and adaptation across devices, networks, and compute tiers so experiences remain coherent and efficient.Trusted & Intelligent Systems-Create privacy-first personalization, trustworthy adaptation, policy control, and secure data architectures for intelligent edge systems.Key ResponsibilitiesResearch Vision and Scientific Leadership• Define and maintain the long-term scientific vision, mission, and driving research questions for their research program• Establish and evolve decade-scale science arcs that begin with sound and audio where appropriate and expand deliberately toward multimodal, distributed, and intelligent edge systems.• Operate research programs to produce durable, defensible capability layers rather than isolated technical breakthroughs or opportunistic projects.• Set the scientific quality bar for the program’s foundational assets, including models, datasets, evaluation frameworks, reference implementations, and core intellectual property.• Represent the research team in executive-level discussions and recommend long-range technical direction, major bets, and scientific tradeoffs.Team Building and Attracting Talent• Recruit, attract, and retain outstanding researchers, engineers, and collaborators who can raise the technical ambition and execution quality of the research team.• Build a high-performing team culture that combines scientific depth, systems thinking, disciplined exploration, and practical translation.• Mentor senior technical contributors, help identify future program leads, and create an environment where top researchers want to do their best work.• Develop external academic and advanced technology partnerships to strengthen Bose’s access to frontier ideas and talent.Program Formation and Portfolio Leadership• Translate long-arc scientific questions into 12–36 month programs with clear hypotheses, milestones, output expectations, and funding decision gates.• Work with the Program Portfolio function in corporate strategy to launch, review, redirect, or stop programs based on scientific learning, platform leverage, and strategic fit.• Ensure programs produce deployable artifacts such as reusable primitives, APIs, evaluation harnesses, datasets, and reference models rather than stand-alone demos.• Balance exploration, foundational asset creation, and near-term offramps without allowing the research to become feature-driven or fragmented.Cross-Franchise Systems Alignment• Partner with the peer Research Leads to align work across perception, sensing, orchestration, trust, rendering, and efficient edge deployment.• Ensure work can plug into shared system architectures spanning devices, environments, networks, and ecosystems.• Prevent scientific duplication and research fragmentation through shared roadmaps, technical interfaces, and evaluation language across the lab.Research Translation to Enterprise Value • Partner with strategy, engineering, and business stakeholders to map research outputs into products, platform modules, middleware, licensable IP, strategic pilots, and venture opportunities.• Partner with Commercialization team to define technology deployment paths through consumer products, engineered systems, software/middleware, and foundational IP.• Advocate for research investment based on long-term strategic leverage and system position, not only on short-term feature demand.External Scientific Leadership• Represent Bose in collaborations with universities, research institutes, national labs, standards groups, and advanced technology partners relevant to the franchise domain.• Strengthen Bose’s external reputation as a serious long-horizon research organization by contributing visible scientific leadership and thought partnership in external technical communities.• Maintain awareness of emerging technical, ecosystem, and policy developments that may affect research direction or timing.Qualifications• 12+ years of experience in advanced research, applied science, or deep technology development in one or more relevant domains such as computational perception, auditory neuroscience, AI/ML, sensing systems, signal processing, robotics, distributed systems, privacy/security, trustworthy AI, or edge computing.• Demonstrated ability to define and lead long-term technical or scientific agendas under uncertainty.• Demonstrated record of attracting, building, or leading high-caliber research teams, labs, or multidisciplinary technical groups.• Strong systems thinking capabilities and comfort operating across multiple technical disciplines and abstraction layers.• Track record of translating research into platform capabilities, deployable technology, foundational IP, or durable technical assets.• Exceptional communication skills, with the ability to influence research, engineering, strategy, product, and executive stakeholders.• Experience collaborating with academic institutions, research labs, or advanced technology ecosystems.Preferred Qualifications• Experience working in leading research organizations such as corporate research labs, advanced technology groups, national labs, frontier technology startups, or top-tier academic labs.• Recognized thought leadership in a domain relevant to one of the four Bose Research franchises, demonstrated through scientific impact, patents, open-source contributions, standards activity, or other field-shaping work.• Experience leading work that starts in audio, acoustics, or human perception and expands into broader intelligent systems, multimodal environments, or edge platforms.• Experience with low-power edge deployment, resource-constrained inference, distributed systems, or privacy-first adaptive systems.• Advanced degree (PhD or equivalent experience) in engineering, computer science, applied science, neuroscience, or a related field.• Strong external research and recruiting network across academia or advanced technology ecosystems.Early Measures of SuccessSuccess in this role will be measured by the scientific clarity, team quality, architectural value, and long-term impact of the program learning, not just by near-term feature output.Within the first 12 months, Research Program Leads will:• define and document a clear research mission, boundaries, and 10-year science arcs • build the research team and talent plan, with key recruiting priorities, capability gaps, and partnership targets clearly defined• launch multiple projects so the research program reflects the intended science thesis• establish a roadmap for foundational assets, including models, datasets, evaluation harnesses, interfaces, and reference implementations• align with strategy, engineering, and research leadership on an off-ramp roadmap for the program’s most promising outputs• Enable at least one research capability to show a credible path into a deployable primitive, platform layer, or strategic pilotAt Bose, you're inspired to be and do your best and are rewarded for your unique talents! Our compensation is thoughtfully tailored to your skills, experience, education, and location, and goes beyond base salary. The hiring range for this position in the primary work location of Framingham, Massachusetts is: $271,100-$372,800.The hiring range for other Bose work locations may vary. In addition to competitive base pay we offer rewards including bonus programs, comprehensive health and welfare benefits, a 401(k) plan, plus exclusive perks designed to support your wellbeing, and a generous employee discount where you can immerse yourself in our products and experiences. We are a proudly independent company—driven by purpose, guided by our values, and united by a belief in the power of sound. As the world leader in audio experiences, we’re creating what’s next—pushing boundaries and delivering transformative sound experiences for people everywhere. Join us and make your next career move a mic-drop. Let’s Make Waves.‎ SummaryLocation: US, MA - FraminghamType: Full time