Lead Research Scientist

Neo Research (新衡) is an independent AI safety research organization based in Singapore. We study frontier risks in increasingly capable AI systems, with a particular focus on the open-weight model ecosystem and the rapidly growing frontier-model ecosystem in Asia.

Some of the world’s most capable open-weight models are now being developed in Asia and deployed globally. Yet, they remain poorly understood from a frontier-safety perspective. We want to understand how to ensure their safety, and what new risks become important as the frontier changes.

Our current work focuses on misalignment, loss of control, and harmful manipulation. We study questions such as whether models pursue unintended objectives, conceal problematic behaviour, recognize and adapt to evaluations, evade oversight, or become less safe as they are given greater autonomy. Our goal is to produce rigorous empirical evidence about risks that are important but difficult to measure.

We are looking for a Lead Research Scientist to help determine what Neo should work on next, and to build the research programme needed to answer those questions. This is a role for someone who wants substantial ownership over both individual research projects and the direction of a growing research organization.

Neo is still early enough that our research agenda is malleable: You will have substantial influence over what we study, what standards of evidence we adopt, which projects we stop, and where we choose to make concentrated bets.

You will join a team of researchers and engineers, active projects underway, dedicated research budget and compute, and a growing network of external collaborators. Your central responsibility will be to identify the questions where Neo can make a distinctive contribution and build the research needed to answer them convincingly.

The role also comes with an unusual path from research to impact. We have presented our work to most major Chinese frontier-model developers and are running a joint evaluations project with an AI Safety Institute. The Lead Research Scientist will help deepen these relationships, while ensuring that Neo's public research is rigorous enough to shape how frontier risks are understood and evaluated internationally. Our mission statement covers the current research directions in more detail.

• Set and evolve Neo’s research agenda, deciding where our researchers, engineers, compute, and external collaborations can have the greatest impact.

• Lead major research projects yourself, from problem selection and methodology through analysis and publication.

• Develop rigorous approaches to studying difficult-to-observe frontier-model behaviours, including cases where models may recognize evaluations or have incentives to conceal relevant behaviour.

• Guide and mentor researchers, review experimental designs and results, and help maintain a high bar for evidence across Neo’s work.

• Work closely with research engineers to turn ambitious research questions into robust experimental systems.

• Build collaborations with AI Safety Institutes, frontier labs, academics, and model developers, and represent Neo’s research externally.

• Help recruit exceptional researchers and shape Neo’s research culture as the organization grows.

You may be an established research leader, or an exceptional researcher ready for your first opportunity to lead a serious agenda. In either case, we care most about research judgment: the ability to recognise important questions, choose tractable approaches, and produce rigorous work.

You should have:

• A track record of original research in AI safety, model evaluations, machine learning, or a closely related field.

• Strong understanding of frontier-model behaviour and evaluation or elicitation methodology.

• The ability to turn broad problems into concrete research programmes and published results.

• Excellent technical writing and the ability to communicate with researchers, engineers, and external partners.

• Comfort operating in an early-stage environment where the important questions are not fully settled.

• A collaborative working style and willingness to stay hands-on.

Helpful, but not required:

• A PhD or equivalent research output.

• Research on dangerous capabilities, alignment, agentic systems, or model evaluations.

• Experience leading research projects or building a research function.

• Familiarity with frontier safety reports, the EU AI Act, or NIST AI RMF.

• Mandarin reading or writing ability.

Location:

This role can be based in Singapore or remotely.

Our team is globally distributed, so remote team members should be comfortable maintaining some working-hour overlap with colleagues across regions.

Compensation:

Our compensation takes location, experience, and level into account, with indicative salary ranges of $200,000 - $250,000+. We may offer above this range for exceptional candidates.

Benefits:

Competitive benefits and leave policies.