AI RECRUITING

The hardest hires in tech. Made by recruiters who actually know AI.

Axe AI Recruiting places ML engineers, AI researchers, Heads of AI, and applied AI leaders across every industry. Built by a dedicated technical recruiting team that speaks the language — not generalist tech recruiters with a buzzword shortcut.

WHY AI RECRUITING BREAKS GENERALIST FIRMS

AI hiring is structurally different from software hiring. Most recruiters miss it.

01 — Wrong technical filters

Generalist recruiters screen for 'PyTorch experience' and miss the researchers who built the models PyTorch is implementing. Surface-level keyword matching produces surface-level shortlists.

02 — Compensation mismatches

AI compensation moves faster than the rest of tech. A search firm working off 12-month-old comp data underprices roles and loses finalists at offer.

03 — Mistaken credentialism

Top AI talent doesn't always come from a PhD pipeline. Recruiters who filter exclusively for academic credentials miss the practitioners — and the practitioners are often the strongest hires.

04 — Pre-IPO equity confusion

AI roles increasingly come with complex equity packages, RSU acceleration triggers, retention bonuses. Recruiters who can't structure the offer lose the candidate in negotiation.

OUR AI PRACTICE

A dedicated technical team. Built for AI from the ground up.

Most recruiting firms claim AI expertise. Few have dedicated teams for it. Axe AI Recruiting is a separate practice within the firm — recruiters whose entire mandate is AI, machine learning, and applied AI roles. They track the field, attend the conferences, follow the labs, and build relationships with the researchers and engineers who define it.

We place AI talent across every industry. SaaS and tech-native companies. Financial services adopting ML at scale. Construction and supply chain rebuilding workflows around computer vision and forecasting. Healthcare AI startups. Industrial automation. Defense and government. If AI is being deployed, our practice has worked the talent market.

Axe AI Recruiting fits when you:

Hire ML engineers, research scientists, AI/ML platform engineers
Build out a Head of AI, VP AI, or AI Research function
Want recruiters who actually understand the work
Need access to candidates who don’t apply to job postings
Compete with FAANG and frontier labs for talent
Want compensation calibrated to current AI market, not last year’s

ROLES WE PLACE

From founding engineers to Heads of AI.

A dedicated practice

One AI team. Every AI role.

Researchers, engineers, leaders — across every industry where AI is being built.

Technical Contributors

Machine Learning Engineers
Research Scientists (ML, NLP, Computer Vision, RL)
Applied AI Engineers
ML Platform / MLOps Engineers
AI Infrastructure Engineers
Data Scientists (senior / staff / principal)
Foundation Model Researchers
Computer Vision Engineers
NLP / LLM Engineers
Robotics / Autonomous Systems Engineers

Leadership & Strategy

Head of AI
VP / Director of Machine Learning
VP / Director of AI Research
Chief AI Officer
Director of Applied AI
Head of ML Platform
Director of AI Strategy
Founding ML Engineers (Series A–B startups)
AI Product Leaders

We've also placed adjacent technical leaders — AI-focused product managers, AI sales engineers, AI policy and ethics leads, AI research operations — wherever our clients need talent who understands the work.

WHAT'S INCLUDED IN EVERY SEARCH

Technical recruiting done right.

01 — Calibration with engineering leadership

We screen with your CTO, Head of AI, or technical hiring manager. Not HR alone. The brief is technical because the role is technical.

02 — Dedicated AI recruiters

Your search is run by recruiters whose entire practice is AI. Not generalist tech recruiters with one client doing ML.

03 — Active research outreach

We don’t post jobs. We map the labs, the conferences, the publication record, and the actual practitioners — then reach them directly.

04 — Technical assessment design

We help structure interview loops that actually screen for the work. Not LeetCode theater for senior ML engineers who haven’t done a binary tree problem in five years.

05 — Current compensation data

We track AI compensation across stages, geographies, and specializations. Your offer is calibrated to what the market is actually paying right now.

06 — Equity and offer structuring

RSUs, refresh grants, acceleration, retention bonuses. We help structure offers that close — and explain the math to candidates evaluating multiple competing offers.

OUR PROCESS

Six stages. AI-specific. Calibrated for the technical hiring loop.

STAGE 1

Week 1 — Technical calibration

Working sessions with hiring manager and engineering leadership. Tech stack, research direction, must-have skills, deal-breakers, equity model.

STAGE 2

Week 1–2 — Market mapping

Comprehensive map of viable candidates by lab, company, publication record, and conference activity. Long list of 30-60 practitioners identified.

STAGE 3

Week 2–4 — Direct outreach

Personalized outreach to mapped candidates. Researcher-to-researcher framing, no recruiter spam. Active conversations narrowed to genuine interest.

STAGE 4

Week 3–6 — Technical screening

Structured screening calibrated to the role’s actual work. Resume review, technical conversation, work-sample evaluation where relevant.

STAGE 5

Week 5–8 — Shortlist and interview

Calibrated shortlist presented. Technical interview rounds, system design, research presentation, team fit conversations.

STAGE 6

Week 7–10 — Offer and close

Offer structuring, equity calibration, counter-offer strategy, start-date discipline. Onboarding handoff.

ENGAGEMENT MODELS

Per-search retained. Per-Seat embedded. Contingency for specific roles.

Featured

Retained Search

For senior AI leaders

✓ Exclusive partnership per search
✓ Dedicated technical recruiter lead
✓ Full market map and direct outreach
✓ Structured technical assessment
✓ 12-month replacement guarantee
✓ Typical timeline: 8-12 weeks

Per-Seat AI Recruiting

For AI function builds (6+ roles)

✓ Dedicated AI recruiter embedded
✓ Up to 8 active roles per seat
✓ Fixed monthly fee
✓ 90-day replacement guarantee
✓ See Per-Seat Recruiting for full details

Contingency Search

For mid-level AI roles

✓ Multiple firms may compete
✓ Fee on successful placement
✓ Same technical screening discipline
✓ 90-day replacement guarantee
✓ Typical timeline: 4-8 weeks

FIT

Axe AI Recruiting fits specific situations.

STRONG FIT

✓ Hiring AI/ML technical talent at any level
✓ Building a new AI function or research team
✓ Competing with FAANG and frontier labs for talent
✓ Want recruiters who understand the technical work
✓ Need access to passive candidates and researchers
✓ Working through complex equity structuring

PROBABLY NOT YET

Single junior ML engineer hire — use Contingency
“AI-adjacent” roles like data analyst — use Permanent Search
No clarity on what the role actually needs — call us first to scope

INDUSTRIES SERVED

AI is being built everywhere. So is our practice.

SaaS & Tech-Native · Financial Services · Construction & Supply Chain · Healthcare AI · Industrial Automation · Energy · Defense & Government · Retail & E-commerce · Media & Content · Autonomous Vehicles · Robotics · Climate Tech · Cybersecurity · Education · Pharmaceuticals · Manufacturing

WHY AXE FOR AI RECRUITING

A dedicated practice. Not a buzzword strategy.

01 — Dedicated AI team

Recruiters whose entire mandate is AI. Not generalist tech recruiters with one ML req.

02 — Operator-led

Our practice is led by people who actually understand the work — research vs. applied, foundation models vs. fine-tuning, RL vs. supervised, the whole landscape.

03 — Live market data

We track AI compensation, equity packages, and offer trends in real time. Your offer doesn’t lag the market.

04 — Research-quality outreach

Our outreach reads like a fellow practitioner reaching out. Not a recruiter blast. Candidates respond at 4x typical recruiter rates.

05 — Cross-industry depth

We’ve placed AI talent in SaaS, finance, construction, supply chain, healthcare, defense, and more. We bring cross-pollination most niche AI shops can’t.

06 — Offer-stage discipline

AI offers fail on equity structure. We help calibrate, negotiate, and close — not hand the offer letter over and hope.

QUESTIONS

Things buyers ask before signing.

Do you work with foundation model labs and frontier AI companies?

Yes. We’ve placed talent for clients across the AI ecosystem — from frontier labs to companies fine-tuning open-source models, to enterprises building applied AI on top. Our practice spans the full stack.

How is Axe AI Recruiting different from niche AI-only firms?

Most niche AI firms specialize in one slice (LLMs, computer vision, robotics) and treat everything else as out-of-scope. We bring the focused depth of an AI practice combined with the cross-industry context of a broader firm. We’ve placed ML engineers at fintech companies who needed someone who understood both ML and regulated environments — a combination niche shops often miss.

Do you place researchers, or just engineers?

Both. We’ve placed research scientists at academic-track positions and applied research engineers at production teams. Different searches, different networks, but both within our practice.

How do you handle compensation calibration for AI roles?

We maintain current comp data for AI roles across stages, geographies, and specializations. We track base salary, RSU grants, refresh policies, sign-on bonuses, and total comp packages from active searches. We can advise on offer structure before you go to market with the role.

Start an AI search.

A 30-minute scoping conversation with our AI practice lead. Technical depth from the first call.

✓Dedicated AI recruiting team
✓12-month replacement guarantee on retained search
✓Current compensation data across the AI market
✓Offer-stage equity and negotiation support