Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) is a private research institution devoted to excellence in research in numerous disciplines and designated to the role of keeping the Autonomous Province of Trento in the mainstream of European and international research. Each research area is assigned to a specific research center, of which there are twelve totals. Information regarding the research centers, their activities and production is available at http://www.fbk.eu/research-centers .

Workplace

The Digital Industry Center is one of the Centers of FBK. It focuses its research on digital technologies for the various domains in industry (e.g., manufacturing, aerospace, railway, automotive, energy, agriculture, manufacturing) by creating applications for critical systems, adaptive and autonomous systems, advanced perception, diagnostics, quality control, and prediction systems. Further research areas include translation, precision farming, robotics, metrology, cultural heritage, and geomatics.
The Machine Translation (MT) Unit pursues research in the field of automatic translation, both from text and speech, to enable multilingual communication across modalities. Its core activities include the creation of advanced models and their adaptation to diverse contexts, domains, and applications (e.g. simultaneous speech translation and subtitling), leveraging the latest technology, including LLMs and foundation models. The unit also conducts fundamental and applied research that focuses on the ethical and societal impact of translation technology, with a long history in the design of evaluation methods, resources and studies that include human participants (e.g. gender inclusive and human-centered AI).

FBK actively seeks diversity and inclusion in the workplace and is also committed to promoting gender equality. To promote the inclusion of disabled staff as per law 68/99, the Foundation is available and interested in evaluating the applications received for technical-scientific domains that do not correspond exactly to this call.

Job Description

The successful candidate is expected to research, design, and develop advanced models for multimodal (speech and video) processing, with a focus on novel architectures, fine-tuning strategies, integration of background knowledge (e.g., documents from knowledge bases), integration of speech and video modalities into LLMs, and optimization for computational efficiency. The candidate will also contribute to the evaluation and integration of these solutions in real-world use cases.
The successful candidate will contribute to the following tasks:

• Conduct research in one or more of the following areas: multimodal (speech, video) integration, speech translation, and low-resource fine-tuning;
• Design, develop, and deploy advanced machine learning algorithms, with a focus on efficiency;
• Collaborate with team members to integrate research outcomes into practical solutions;
• Contribute to publications and present research outcomes.

Job requirements

The ideal candidate should have:

• Master’s Degree in areas related to Computer Science;
• Solid background in deep learning;
• Strong theoretical knowledge of the foundational concepts behind multimodal LLMs (e.g., Transformer architecture);
• Excellent programming skills (Python);
• Good knowledge and proficiency in the English language;
• Team-oriented with excellent communication and interpersonal skills;
• Self-driven and proactive, contributing actively to common research goals

Furthermore, the following elements will be positively evaluated:

• PhD Degree in areas related to Computer Science;
• Expertise in working on large-scale projects and distributed environments;
• Ability to develop and manage a research agenda, including contributing to research proposals and mentoring students;
• Strong publication record (major conferences and top-ranked journals) in one or more of the following fields: machine translation, speech translation.

Employment

Type of contract: fixed-term contract
Working hours : Full time (38 h per week)
Start date : February 2026
Duration : 24 months with the possibility of extending the contract depending on funding
Workplace : Povo, Trento
Gross annual salary: from €38,539.67 to about €44,087.26, depending on background and expertise in the field, plus objectives achievements bonus
Benefits : flexi-time, company subsidized cafeteria or meal vouchers, internal car park, welcome office support for visa formalities and for research in accommodation, accommodation etc., supplementary pension and health fund, social security (SANIFONDS), family-work balance, free training courses, support on bank account opening, discount on public transport, sport, language course fees, counseling and psychological support service. More info at https://www.fbk.eu/en/work-with-us/

Application
Interested candidates are requested to submit their application by completing the online form ( https://jobs.fbk.eu/ ). Please make sure that your application contains the following attachments (in pdf format):

• Detailed CV including relevant past experiences (as an attached document in PDF format);
• Cover Letter (explaining your motivation for this specific position).

Application deadline: Wednesday, December 10th, 2025

Please read our Recruitment Regulations before completing your application.

For further information or technical issues regarding the application, please contact the People Innovation for Research Department at jobs@fbk.eu .