Expert Data Scientist

Ciklum is looking for an Expert Data Scientist to join our team full-time in India. We are a custom product engineering company that supports both multinational organizations and scaling startups to solve their most complex business challenges. With a global team of over 4,000 highly skilled developers, consultants, analysts and product owners, we engineer technology that redefines industries and shapes the way people live. About the role: As an Expert Data Scientist, become a part of a cross-functional development team engineering experiences of tomorrow. The Expert/Principal Data Scientist is a senior technical leader responsible for setting the standard for evaluation-driven development across the organization's AI/ML and analytics portfolio. This person defines modeling strategy, evaluation frameworks, and delivery governance across multiple 45-day release cycles, and is accountable for demonstrating measurable business impact at a portfolio level while mentoring senior and mid-level data scientists. Responsibilities: Evaluation-Driven Development — Strategy & Standards Define and champion the organization's evaluation-driven development framework: standards for selecting modeling approaches (statistical, ML, optimization, simulation, GenAI), evaluation metric design, and validation methodology Establish enterprise guidelines for aligning evaluation metrics to business and process outcomes, ensuring consistency across teams and products Set standards for the use of synthetic data, historical data, and real-world/controlled validation across the model lifecycle, including approval gates before production rollout Own the definition of "measurable improvement" for the portfolio — ensuring every release is backed by a rigorous before/after comparison against business KPIs Delivery Leadership Oversee and be accountable for multiple concurrent workstreams delivered through 45-day versioned agile cycles, ensuring the portfolio consistently ships incremental, measurable value Act as the escalation point for delivery risk, technical trade-offs, and cross-team dependencies across release cycles Partner with product and engineering leadership to prioritize the roadmap based on expected business impact vs. delivery cost/risk Platform, MLOps & Cost Set architectural and MLOps direction for AI/ML platforms and analytics products on AWS, including model deployment patterns, monitoring, and automated governance Own cost-management and performance-optimization strategy for data and ML workloads at scale, setting budgets and efficiency targets across teams Define enterprise approach to synthetic data generation, offline experimentation, and controlled real-world validation, including tooling selection Governance & Compliance Own the framework for balancing model performance, explainability, regulatory compliance, and cost across the portfolio, including escalation criteria for high-risk models Represent the data science function in audits, regulatory reviews, and executive reporting on model governance and business impact Leadership Mentor Senior Data Scientists and review their evaluation frameworks, modeling choices, and delivery outcomes Drive adoption of best practices in evaluation-driven development across the organization Requirements: Master's or PhD in Data Science, Statistics, Computer Science, Operations Research, or related field (or equivalent demonstrated experience) 10+ years of experience delivering data science/ML/analytics solutions, including leadership of technical strategy at a portfolio or platform level Proven track record of selecting and justifying modeling approaches across statistical, ML, optimization, simulation, and GenAI paradigms based on business context Deep experience defining evaluation metrics tied to business and process KPIs, and demonstrating measurable outcomes from delivered models Extensive hands-on and architectural experience with AWS AI/ML platforms and MLOps practices at scale Demonstrated ownership of agile, versioned delivery cycles across multiple teams or products Strong track record balancing model performance, explainability, compliance, and cost trade-offs, including in regulated environments Experience designing synthetic data strategies, offline experimentation frameworks, and controlled real-world validation programs Excellent stakeholder management and executive communication skills Desirable: Experience presenting model governance and impact metrics to executive or regulatory audiences Publications, patents, or public speaking in applied ML/AI evaluation methodology Experience building or scaling MLOps platforms from the ground up What’s in it for you? Strong community: Work alongside top professionals in a friendly, open-door environment Growth focus: Take on large-scale projects with a global impact and expand your expertise Tailored learning: Boost your skills with internal events (meetups, conferences, workshops), Udemy access, language courses, and company-paid certifications Endless opportunities: Explore diverse domains through internal mobility, finding the best fit to gain hands-on experience with cutting-edge technologies Care: We’ve got you covered with company-paid medical insurance, mental health support, and financial & legal consultations About us: At Ciklum, we are always exploring innovations, empowering each other to achieve more, and engineering solutions that matter. With us, you’ll work with cutting-edge technologies, contribute to impactful projects, and be part of a One Team culture that values collaboration and progress. India is a strategic innovation hub for Ciklum, with growing teams in Chennai and Pune leading advancements in EdgeTech, AR/VR, IoT, and beyond. Join us to collaborate on game-changing solutions and take your career to the next level. Explore, empower, engineer with Ciklum! Interested already? We would love to get to know you! Submit your application. We can’t wait to see you at Ciklum. #LI-HB3