Huawei Canada has an immediate 12-month contract opening for a Researcher. About the team: The Software-Hardware System Optimization Lab continuously improves the power efficiency and performance of smartphone products through software-hardware systems optimization and architecture innovation. We keep tracking the trends of cutting-edge technologies, building the competitive strength of mobile AI, graphics, multimedia, and software architecture for mobile phone products. About the job: We are seeking a highly motivated AI Researcher to explore and advance state-of-the-art LLMs and VLMs. This role combines fundamental AI/ML research with hands-on implementation to improve model performance and efficiency. * Conduct research on LLMs and VLMs, with a focus on performance and efficiency. * Apply techniques such as fine-tuning, knowledge distillation, MoE, and pruning. * Enhance Vision models for improved perception in practical applications. * Implement and maintain experiments using Python and modern ML frameworks. * Collaborate with researchers and mentors in ideation and review sessions. * Contribute to publications in top-tier conferences (e.g., NeurIPS, CVPR, ICML, AAAI). About the ideal candidate: * MSc or PhD in Computer Science, Engineering, or related fields. * Strong foundation in AI and machine learning. * Hands-on experience with large-scale foundation models (e.g., DeepSeek, Smol, InternVL, Qwen, LLaMA). * Familiarity with fine-tuning (e.g., LoRA), prompt tuning, model pruning, MoE, and distillation methods. * Proficient in Python, PyTorch, Git, and Linux shell scripting. * Experience with Hugging Face, MLflow, DeepSpeed, Apex, Fairscale, etc. * Excellent communication and collaboration skills. * Demonstrated research experience through publications.