Applied Scientist, Alexa Sensitive Content Intelligence (ASCI)

Amazon.com, Inc.; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 65,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading technology company in Greater London seeks a Senior Applied Scientist specializing in NLP and CV. You will design and develop machine learning solutions, mentor fellow scientists, and contribute to customer-facing products that enhance user experience. Candidates should possess a PhD or Master's degree with significant experience in modeling and algorithms. The role offers a hybrid work environment and the opportunity to innovate in AI technologies.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of building models for business applications.
• Strong understanding of natural language processing and computer vision.
• Experience in research with patents or publications in top-tier conferences.

Responsibilities

• Lead science solution design and run experiments.
• Develop algorithms to optimize customer experience.
• Mentor junior scientists and guide their work.

Skills

NLP models

CV models

Algorithms and data structures

Programming in Java, C++, Python

Education

PhD in Computer Science or related field

Master's degree and 4+ years of experience

Tools

Unix/Linux

Job description

Alexa+ is Amazon’s next-generation, AI-powered virtual assistant. Building on the original Alexa, it uses generative AI to deliver a more conversational, personalized, and effective experience. Alexa Sensitive Content Intelligence (ASCI) team is developing responsible AI (RAI) solutions for Alexa+, empowering it to provide useful information responsibly. The team is currently looking for Applied Scientists with a strong background in NLP and/or CV to design and develop ML solutions in the RAI space using generative AI across all languages and countries.

An Applied Scientist will be part of a team of exceptional scientists to develop novel algorithms and modeling techniques to advance the state of the art in Natural Language Processing (NLP) or Computer Vision (CV) related tasks. They will work in a hybrid, fast-paced organization where scientists, engineers, and product managers collaborate to build customer-facing experiences. They will collaborate with and mentor other scientists to raise the bar of scientific research at Amazon. Their work will directly impact our customers in the form of products and services that use speech, language, and computer vision technologies.

We are looking for candidates with strong technical experience and a passion for building science-driven solutions in a fast-paced environment. This Senior Applied Scientist should have a deep understanding of NLP models (e.g., LSTM, transformer-based models) or CV models (e.g., CNN, AlexNet, ResNet), and know where to apply them in different business cases. They should leverage exceptional technical expertise, a solid understanding of computer science fundamentals, and practical experience building large-scale distributed systems to create reliable, scalable, high-performance products. In addition to technical depth, they must possess exceptional communication skills and understand how to influence key stakeholders.

This Applied Scientist will join a select group of people making history producing one of the most highly rated products in Amazon’s history. If you are looking for a challenging and innovative role where you can solve important problems while growing as a leader, this may be the place for you.

Key job responsibilities

This Applied Scientist will lead the science solution design, run experiments, research new algorithms, and find new ways of optimizing customer experience. They will set examples for the team on good science practice and standards. Beyond theoretical innovation, they will work closely with talented engineers and ML scientists to put algorithms and models into practice.

This Applied Scientist’s work will also directly impact the trust customers place in Alexa, globally. They will contribute directly to our growth by hiring smart and motivated scientists to establish teams that can deliver swiftly and predictably, adjusting in an agile fashion to deliver what our customers need.

A day in the life

You will work with a group of talented scientists on researching algorithms and running experiments to test scientific proposals/solutions to improve our sensitive contents detection and mitigation. This will involve collaboration with partner teams including engineering, PMs, data annotators, and other scientists to discuss data quality, policy, and model development. You will mentor other scientists, review and guide their work, help develop roadmaps for the team, and work closely with partner teams across Alexa to deliver platform features that require cross-team leadership.

About the team

The mission of the Alexa Sensitive Content Intelligence (ASCI) team is to (1) minimize negative surprises to customers caused by sensitive content, (2) detect and prevent potential brand-damaging interactions, and (3) build customer trust through appropriate interactions on sensitive topics. The term “sensitive content” includes within its scope a wide range of categories of content such as offensive content (e.g., hate speech, racist speech), profanity, content that is suitable only for certain age groups, politically polarizing content, and religiously polarizing content. The term “content” refers to any material that is exposed to customers by Alexa (including both 1P and 3P experiences) and includes text, speech, audio, and video.

Basic Qualifications

• 3+ years of building models for business application experience
• PhD, or Master’s degree and 4+ years of CS, CE, ML or related field experience
• Experience in patents or publications at top‑tier peer‑reviewed conferences or journals
• Experience programming in Java, C++, Python or related language
• Experience in any of the following areas: algorithms and data structures, parsing, numerical optimization, data mining, parallel and distributed computing, high-performance computing

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience using Unix/Linux
• Experience in professional software development

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Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.