Principal Scientist, Foundation Model Understanding Data Architect

About the Role

We are seeking a Principal Scientist (P60) to define and lead the data and semantic architecture that enables Adobe Fireflys nextgeneration unified foundation modelsmodels that natively combine understanding reasoning and generation within a single system.
This role sits within the Applied Science and Machine Learning (ASML) organization and operates at the highest level of technical leadership. You will shape how meaning intent and abstraction are represented and learned at foundationmodel scale influencing multiple generations of models and products. This is a highly strategic individual contributor role with broad organizational impact.

What Youll Do

Foundation Model Data Vision

• Define the multiyear vision for understandingcentric data that enables unified comprehension and generation.
• Establish core principles for semantic representation supervision and curriculum at foundationmodel scale.
• Identify limitations in existing data paradigms and drive the invention of new approaches.

Semantic Architecture & Alignment

• Design canonical semantic abstractions that bridge perceptionlevel signals with highlevel concepts such as intent reasoning and compositional structure.
• Lead the evolution of supervision schemas toward rich modelinterpretable semantic signals.
• Guide the use of multimodal and visionlanguage models to bootstrap scalable understanding data.

Data Curriculum & Model Behavior

• Define understandingfocused data curricula across model scale and training phases.
• Lead ablations to quantify how semantic data choices affect generalization controllability and robustness.
• Balance organic synthetic and modelgenerated data to optimize learning efficiency.

Organizational Leadership

• Serve as the technical authority for foundationmodel understanding data across Adobe.
• Influence research infrastructure and product roadmaps through principled datadriven guidance.
• Mentor senior scientists and architects; set standards for rigor and reproducibility.

What You Need to Succeed

• 10 years of experience in ML data systems or AI research including leadership on largescale or foundation models.
• Demonstrated impact shaping data learning paradigms or representations for LLMs or multimodal models.
• Deep expertise in semantic representation reasoning and abstraction.
• Strong intuition for interactions between data model architecture and training dynamics.
• Ability to influence senior technical and business leaders through clear technical judgment.

Education

• Ph.D. in Computer Science Machine Learning AI or a related field strongly preferred.

About Adobe

Adobe empowers everyone to create through innovative platforms and tools that unleash creativity productivity and personalized customer experiences. Adobes industry-leading offerings including Adobe Acrobat Studio Adobe Express Adobe Firefly Creative Cloud Adobe Experience Platform Adobe Experience Manager and GenStudio enable people and businesses to turn ideas into impact powered by AI and driven by human ingenuity.

Our 30000 employees worldwide are creating the future and raising the bar as we drive the next decade of growth. Were on a mission to hire the very best and believe in creating a company culture where all employees are empowered to make an impact. At Adobe we believe that great ideas can come from anywhere in the organization. The next big idea could be yours.

Lets Adobe together

At Adobe we believe in creating a company culture where all employees are empowered to make an impact. Learn more about Adobe life including our values and culture focus on people purpose and community Adobe for All comprehensive benefits programs the stories we tell the customers we serve and how you can help us advance our mission of empowering everyone to create.

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Expected Pay Range:

At Adobe for sales roles starting salaries are expressed as total target compensation (TTC base commission) and short-term incentives are in the form of sales commission plans. Non-sales roles starting salaries are expressed as base salary and short-term incentives are in the form of the Annual Incentive Plan (AIP).

In addition certain roles may be eligible for long-term incentives in the form of a new hire equity award.

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California:

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Colorado:

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Massachusetts:

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