Applied Researcher 5

Discover Financial
San Francisco, Cambridge, New York, San Jose, Virginia
Full timeUSD 262,500 - 326,800 annuallyFunction: Research & Scientific (R&D)Education: phdSkills: ["Leadership","Interpersonal skills","Translating complexity","Innovative thinking","Creative problem-solving"]

Build and deploy AI foundation models that power new customer experiences across the AI Foundations team. Partner with data scientists, ML engineers, and product leaders to design, train, evaluate, validate, and implement production-ready research. Use a modern stack including PyTorch, AWS Ultraclusters, Hugging Face, and Lightning to push state-of-the-art techniques—especially for large deep learning, LLM fine-tuning, optimization, and robustness—into scalable systems.

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FursaFursa
Discover Financial
Discover Financial
14 hours ago

Applied Researcher 5

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Last checked: 14 hours agoStatus: Live

Job Summary

Build and deploy AI foundation models that power new customer experiences across the AI Foundations team. Partner with data scientists, ML engineers, and product leaders to design, train, evaluate, validate, and implement production-ready research. Use a modern stack including PyTorch, AWS Ultraclusters, Hugging Face, and Lightning to push state-of-the-art techniques—especially for large deep learning, LLM fine-tuning, optimization, and robustness—into scalable systems.
Location: San Francisco, Cambridge, New York, San Jose, Virginia
Employment Type: Full time
Job Function: Research & Scientific (R&D)

Key Responsibilities

  • •Partner with cross-functional teams to deliver AI-powered products that change how customers interact with their money.
  • •Leverage technologies (PyTorch, AWS Ultraclusters, Hugging Face, Lightning) to extract insights from large numeric and textual datasets.
  • •Build AI foundation models across development phases: design, training, evaluation, validation, and implementation.
  • •Conduct high-impact applied research and translate new AI developments into next-generation customer experiences.
  • •Lead cross-functional research threads that bridge prototype model development and deployment with ML engineering partners.

Pay and Benefits

Salary: USD 262,500 - 326,800 annually

Key Requirements

  • •PhD in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, AI, Mathematics, or related fields (or obtaining by the scheduled start date) with applied research experience and/or an MS plus applied research experience as described.
  • •Hands-on experience developing AI foundation models and solutions using open-source tools and cloud computing platforms.
  • •Deep understanding of AI methodology foundations and experience building large deep learning models (e.g., training optimization, self-supervised learning, robustness, explainability, RLHF).
  • •Track record delivering models at scale for both training data and inference volumes.
  • •Publications and/or contributions demonstrating high-quality research output (e.g., first-author publications or major ML projects).
Experience:Applied researchMachine learningDeep learningLLMs
Education:PhD / Doctorate in PhD in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, AI, Mathematics, or related fields
Skills:LeadershipInterpersonal skillsTranslating complexityInnovative thinkingCreative problem-solving
Tech Stack:PyTorchAWS UltraclustersHuggingfaceLightningPytorch-geometricDGLLLMRLHF

Eligibility

Work Authorization:Sponsorship available.

Company Brief

Discover Financial
Provides consumer banking products, credit cards, personal loans, and payment services through the Discover brand. It operates a major U.S. financial network and serves individuals and merchants with lending and digital payment solutions.
Industry: Retail Banking
Company Size: Enterprise (1,001+ employees)
Revenue: USD 10M to 25M
Growth: Public Company
Valuation: Public Company (Market Cap in USD)
Funding: IPO / Publicly Listed
Headquarters: Riverwoods, United States
Founded: 1985
WebsiteLinkedIn