Thinking Machines Lab's mission is to empower humanity through advancing collaborative general intelligence. We're building a future where everyone has access to the knowledge and tools to make AI work for their unique needs and goals.
We are scientists, engineers, and builders who’ve created some of the most widely used AI products, including ChatGPT and Character.ai, open-weights models like Mistral, as well as popular open source projects like PyTorch, OpenAI Gym, Fairseq, and Segment Anything.
About the Role
We're looking for an attorney to own two functions as the second lawyer on the team: product and commercial.
- Product: You'll work directly with engineering and research, develop deep knowledge of our technical stack, and shape proactive legal strategy for products that don't fit neatly into existing frameworks.
- Commercial: You'll own commercial agreements end-to-end—partnerships, licensing, vendor management—and work with business leadership on go-to-market strategy, IP ownership, and deal structure.
This is a ground-floor role with significant ownership. You'll help build the legal function, ensuring it’s a competitive advantage for Thinking Machines and not a bottleneck.
What You'll Do
- Advise company leadership as well as product, engineering, and research teams on the legal aspects of developing and deploying AI products.
- Proactively identify and address potential legal roadblocks in product development, with a broad view of policy and risk.
- Lead high-profile, high-impact transactions involving AI technology, including complex licensing, joint development agreements, and strategic partnerships that advance the company’s mission and business objectives.
- Structure, draft, and negotiate the whole spectrum of commercial agreements, from enterprise customer contracts to vendor relationships.
- Have a strong say in how our Legal team is developed from the ground up.
Skills and Qualifications
Minimum qualifications:
- 10+ years of legal experience, with significant product counseling and commercial negotiation experience.
- Client counseling skills, with the ability to exercise judgment under uncertainty and communicate practical, solution-focused advice.
- Experience working directly with technical staff, not just intermediaries.
Preferred qualifications — we encourage you to apply if you meet some but not all of these:
- In-house experience at a technology company shipping products with novel legal risk.
- Experience working on AI-powered products or AI transactions, including complex licensing, joint development, and strategic partnerships.
- Familiarity with global data privacy, intellectual property, and regulatory issues specific to the AI domain.
- Significant experience leading complex commercial negotiations for enterprise sales at scale.
Logistics
- Location: This role is based in San Francisco, California.
- Compensation: Depending on background, skills and experience, the expected annual salary range for this position is $325,000 - $425,000 USD.
- Visa sponsorship: We sponsor visas. While we can't guarantee success for every candidate or role, if you're the right fit, we're committed to working through the visa process together.
- Benefits: Thinking Machines offers generous health, dental, and vision benefits, unlimited PTO, paid parental leave, and relocation support as needed.
As set forth in Thinking Machines' Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.