A network built for the frontier.
OpenTalent is the world's most rigorous AI engineering network. We connect frontier labs and AI-native teams with the top 3% of engineers -- pre-training researchers, agent builders, RL specialists, and applied AI engineers -- vetted, matched, and shipping within days.
Mission
Match the world's best AI builders with the work that matters.
Most hiring is a game of logos. We think that's the wrong game. The engineer who shipped a transformer variant in a side project beats the one who listed it on a resume. We built OpenTalent to find the first kind.
Our network isn't a database -- it's a continuously maintained community of engineers who have passed one of the most demanding technical screens in the industry. Every member is reviewed on entry and re-evaluated through every engagement.
We exist to make the next great AI hire feel obvious, fast, and right -- not like a gamble.
// Vision
We believe the best AI engineering work in the world is done by a small number of people who think deeply, move carefully, and ship things that actually work. Those people deserve a network that respects their time and matches them to work worthy of their ability.
We believe frontier teams -- the labs, the AI-native startups, the ambitious product companies -- deserve access to engineers who have already been proven, not just pitched.
The most thoughtful AI work, by the most thoughtful AI builders, for the teams that take the work seriously.
What we believe
Six principles. No exceptions.
These aren't values we put on a wall. They're the rules we use to decide who gets in, what work we take, and how we run every engagement.
Craft over credentials
A clean repo and a thoughtful eval beats a stack of brand-name logos. We hire for taste and rigor -- verified, not assumed.
Speed with depth
72 hours to candidates, weeks to vet them in. Fast doesn't mean shallow -- it means we did the work before you needed it.
Earned membership
Joining the network is hard. Staying in it is harder. Every engagement is reviewed. Excellence is the only renewal contract.
Trust, then leverage
We don't sell resumes. We sell a relationship: matching engineers to problems they'll actually solve, and clients to people they'll actually want to keep.
Frontier first
If it isn't AI-native, it isn't us. Our specialty is the work most agencies haven't seen yet -- agents, RL, multimodal, alignment.
Be plainly useful
No theater. No bloat. We exist to make the next hire feel obvious and the next quarter feel possible.
Where we are today
A network, by the numbers.
Five years of investment in vetting pipelines, lab partnerships, and the back-channels that make great matches happen.
40K+
Vetted AI engineer profiles in our network
3%
Acceptance rate after the 5-stage screen
97%
Trial-to-hire success on matched engagements
~4d
Average scope-to-start time for new roles
The Top 3% Model
A five-stage funnel built for frontier work.
The average technical screen takes two hours and tests syntax. Ours takes weeks and tests judgment. We designed the five stages to surface the engineers who are rigorous, fast, and genuinely good -- not just the ones who prep well.
Every applicant starts from zero. Brand name, prestige, referrals -- they get you a read. They don't get you in. The screen does.
The result is a network where every engineer has been pressure-tested across reasoning, depth, real-world output, live collaboration, and sustained performance.
// The five stages
01 -- Language & reasoning -- fluency, communication, structured problem-solving.
02 -- Deep skill review -- domain-specific technical depth: ML theory, systems, or applied AI depending on track.
03 -- Real-world project -- a take-home evaluation scoped to actual frontier work, reviewed by senior engineers.
04 -- Live panel -- a structured interview with OpenTalent technical leads covering design decisions and tradeoffs.
05 -- Continued excellence -- every engagement is reviewed. Performance is the only membership renewal contract.
What we offer
Three ways frontier teams work with us.
Whether you need one senior engineer tomorrow or a full pod for a defined outcome, we have a model that fits.
// Engagement model
Individual AI engineers
Hand-picked AI-native engineers -- full-time, fractional, or project-based -- embedded directly into your team.
- Match a senior engineer within 72 hours
- Risk-free 2-week trial period before commitment
- Specialists across pre-training, agents, RL, infra, multimodal, applied AI
// Engagement model
AI-native pods
Pre-formed teams of researchers, engineers, and TPMs ready to plug into your stack and ship a defined outcome.
- Composed for your problem shape -- model work, agent stack, evals, infra
- Senior tech lead included, owns delivery against your milestones
- Spin up in days; scale up or down without HR overhead
// Engagement model
Trial-to-hire
Hire one of our engineers as a full-time employee on your team after a successful trial period -- no separate placement fee.
- Try before you hire, on a real project
- Transparent, flat conversion terms
- Post-conversion onboarding support included
// Engagement model
OpenTalent for engineers
The career copilot for AI-native engineers -- the network handles outreach, vetting, contracts, and reviews so engineers can focus on the work.
- Curated engagements at frontier labs and AI-native startups
- Compensation benchmarking and contract support
- Long-term portfolio of work, not one-off gigs
Leadership
The team behind OpenTalent.
A small, senior team with deep roots in engineering services, AI product development, and talent infrastructure.
Gravity Engineering
Parent company
An engineering services and product studio with a decade of work behind it -- the platform team, recruiting infrastructure, and operational discipline that OpenTalent runs on.
The Network
40,000+ engineers
Pre-training and post-training researchers, agent builders, RL specialists, ML infrastructure engineers, multimodality experts, and applied AI engineers -- across 40+ countries.
The story so far
From engineering services to AI talent infrastructure.
A decade of building, vetting, and shipping -- and the conviction that the best AI talent in the world deserves a better way to work.
2015
Gravity Engineering is founded
Gravity Engineering Services Pvt. Ltd. is set up in Bengaluru to build product engineering pods for global tech companies. The seed of what becomes OpenTalent: vetting hard, matching well.
2021
The AI specialization
Our engineering teams ship ML and applied AI work for fast-scaling product companies. We learn what frontier teams actually need -- and how scarce the talent is.
2023
OpenTalent launches
The OpenTalent network is launched as a focused AI engineering platform. The five-stage screening is formalized. Acceptance rate settles below 3%.
2025
Frontier partnerships
Engagements expand into pre-training research, agent infrastructure, RL environment design, and multimodal evals. The network passes 40,000 vetted engineers.
2026
The next chapter
OpenTalent expands into full AI-native pods, trial-to-hire, and the career copilot for engineers. The thesis is unchanged: the best AI work, by the best AI builders.
Build with the top 3% of AI engineers.
Match with a hand-picked AI engineer or build a full AI-native pod. Candidates on a call in 72 hours.