Senior Machine Learning Engineer

Senior Machine Learning Engineer

Location: McLean, VA (hybrid); occasional travel to Durham,  NC and customer sites  

About CoVar

CoVar is a small AI/ML R&D software company with offices in Durham, NC and McLean, VA, that uses artificial intelligence to solve problems that matter.   Our teams build AI/ML solutions that  help the DoD  detect  enemies and  threats,  help  biomedical researchers  find new cures , and  help  monitor machinery  to  prevent injuries and environmental catastrophes.   We are  passionate engineers  dedicated to  pushing the  bounds  of what AI/ML can do in the real   world.  

About the Role

We’re seeking a Senior ML Engineer (Technical Lead) with deep hands-on expertise in machine learning and computer vision, who can also lead DoD-focused programs, own customer engagement, contribute to business development, and help grow and manage a local engineering team in McLean over time. You’ll lead end-to-end technical delivery – from data to deployment – while serving as the primary technical point of contact for our customers.  

This role is ideal for someone who enjoys building production-grade ML systems, mentoring engineers, and translating complex technical work into compelling customer outcomes.  

What  You’ll Do  

• Lead programs end-to-end: Scope requirements, set technical strategy and milestones, plan resourcing, manage risks, and deliver results for DoD-focused ML/CV projects. 


• Own customer relationships: Run technical discussions, requirement discovery, demos, standing meetings, and briefings with senior stakeholders; turn feedback into clear roadmaps. 


• Stay deeply hands-on (50–70%):  
  
  
  
  • Build data pipelines, train/evaluate CV models, and write production code.
  
  
  • Design, train, and optimize detection/segmentation/tracking models and custom computer-vision pipelines; handle imbalanced data, domain shift, and real-world constraints.
  
  
  • Deploy models to production (typically on the edge), instrument for monitoring, and iterate with CI/CD.
  
  


• Contribute to business development: Write technical sections of proposals/white papers, help shape capture strategy, provide level-of-effort estimates, and present prototypes. 


• Communicate and publish: Present results to high-level DoD and industry customers; author technical reports; publish novel work in classified/unclassified settings when applicable.  

Minimum Qualifications

• Experience: 5+ years designing, building, and deploying machine learning systems in production (8+ preferred). Strong track record leading technical delivery for complex projects. 


• ML/CV expertise :  
  
  
  
  • Deep understanding of ML fundamentals (e.g., gradient descent, cross-validation, ROC/PR curves, confusion matrices, mAP).
  
  
  • Computer vision experience with modern architectures (e.g., YOLO family, CenterNet, RetinaNet, Detectron2, ViTs, segmentation networks), augmentation strategies, and evaluation.
  
  
  • Experience with data curation/annotation workflows and dataset quality control.
  
  


• Software engineering: Python (NumPy, scipy, pandas/polars), PyTorch (preferred) or TensorFlow, git, CI/CD pipelines, automated testing, and code quality practices. 


• MLOps & deployment: Experiment tracking, Docker, ONNX/TensorRT, deploying inference services to the edge (e.g., NVIDIA Jetson). 


• Communication & leadership: Excellent technical communication, customer-facing experience, and proven ability to lead cross-functional efforts. 


• Education: B.S. in engineering, math, computer science, or related field; M.S./Ph.D. preferred. 


• Clearance: Eligibility for U.S. security clearance. This requires U.S. citizenship.  

Preferred  Qualifications (Bonus) 

• Prior  Department of Defense project experience, including briefing senior stakeholders and navigating DoD acquisition processes. 


• Active Secret or  TS/SCI clearance; experience working in classified environments. 


• Experience managing or mentoring engineers; contributing to hiring and performance development.  


• Experience with proposal writing (SBIR/STTR, RFPs), technical volume authorship, and live demos.  


• Experience with multi-sensor fusion, signal-processing, tracking, synthetic data generation, domain adaptation, or semi/active learning for data-limited environments.


• Familiarity with edge hardware optimization, and performance profiling.  


• Open-source contributions, publications, or patents in ML/CV.

Why This Role Matters  

You’ll be a key technical leader in our McLean office – setting technical direction, building a local team, and ensuring our DoD partners see tangible mission impact from AI/ML solutions. If you thrive in high-impact environments where you can both  build and  lead , we’d love to talk.  

Benefits

• Competitive salary, cash bonus, equity structure, and 401k with employer contributions


• Excellent health care coverage, including dental and vision plans


• Parental leave


• Short-term and long-term disability insurance


• Life insurance


• Flexible work schedule


• Tuition support


• PTO and paid holidays

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