Job Description

Would you like to solve real world problems using advanced machine learning for the largest online travel company worldwide?

Our Expedia Data Science teams in Geneva are looking for highly capable Senior Data Scientists to utilize machine learning, advanced analytical and statistical techniques in order to power many of the products and features available on our website.

We create state of the art machine learning models to make our travel platform more effective and efficient, increasing its relevance for travelers and travel partners (e.g. hotels) worldwide. For example, we build models to forecast demand, to identify and address competitiveness gaps, and to give guided recommendations on how hotels can grow their business on our platform.

We strive to ensure everything we do has measurable business impact. We build innovative algorithms and models that make intelligent, automated decisions, both in batch and in real time. We collaborate closely with the analytics, market management, product and technology teams.

In this position, you will drive key machine learning initiatives, using data on billions of platform interactions across more than a million hotels and other travel products worldwide. You will utilize advanced machine learning and statistical modeling approaches to impact the business and raise the bar of how we work. You will use the latest cloud and data technologies to train and deploy your models at scale and support key business initiatives. Outstanding test-and-learn culture is essential to thrive in this fast-moving industry; if you can prove the positive impact of your approaches, you will quickly see them in production.

You are technically strong and possess excellent business acumen and communication skills. You can handle both planned and ad-hoc work, own important data products, prioritize workload effectively, and thrive in a dynamic environment. You are self-motivated, a fast learner and work well under pressure to meet deadlines. Communicating your findings and implications to your teammates and to business partners clearly and concisely is key. Your vigorous STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) training and problem-solving skills are particularly important for this job function. You will contribute and make our young team become the industry-leading center of excellence for eCommerce AI and Automation.

What you’ll do:

• You will apply solid scientific skills, strong analytical and innovative thinking to quickly learn new domains and turn innovative ideas into working solutions
• Understand business challenges and formalize them into appropriate machine learning frameworks
• Gather and manipulate large volume of data, build datasets, select and engineer model features
• Develop, assess, and iteratively improve predictive models using advanced machine learning and statistical methods; Be able to debug and correct data assumptions through testing
• Collaborate with business partners, program management, and engineering teams to ensure that solutions meet business needs and have functional feasibility and robustness
• Communicate complex analytical topics in a clean & simple way to multiple partners and senior leadership (both internal & external).
• Develop a good understanding of the industry, our data landscape and how data science can help optimize the work of our business partners
• Keep abreast of latest data science development and share knowledge with the team
• Fulfill ad-hoc requests for data and analysis.

Who you are:

• MSc or PhD in a quantitative field like machine learning, computer science, statistics, applied mathematics/physics
• 3 years industry experience; proven track record of applying innovative machine learning algorithms and econometrics methods to business problems
• Good understanding of data technologies; Hadoop, Hive, Spark, and standard relational database structures along with query languages (SQL); experience with the cloud services (AWS, Qubole, Databricks) a plus
• Expertise in Python, R or Scala; good programing practice, ability to write readable, fast code
• Solid theoretical understanding of machine learning principles and algorithms (supervised/unsupervised, reinforcement learning, deep learning, optimization, recurrent models, adversarial learning, tree-based classification/regression ...)
• Expertise with machine learning frameworks like Tensorflow, PyTorch, Xgboost - relevant for some (not all) of our Senior Data Scientist positions
• Proven track record of working in projects involving cross-functional teams
• Familiarity with software engineering best practices, including version control, release management, incremental delivery, test-driven development, unit testing etc.
• Ability to understand a business problem, identify key challenges, formalize the problem from a data and algorithm perspective, and prototype solutions
• High intellectual curiosity and willingness to tackle complex/technical problems to generate actionable business insights
• Strong verbal and visual communication skills.

Why join us

Expedia Group recognizes our success is dependent on the success of our people. We are the world's travel platform, made up of the most knowledgeable, passionate, and creative people in our business. Our brands recognize the power of travel to break down barriers and make people's lives better – that responsibility inspires us to be the place where exceptional people want to do their best work, and to provide them the tools to do so.

Whether you're applying to work in engineering or customer support, marketing or lodging supply, at Expedia Group we act as one team, working towards a common goal; to bring the world within reach. We relentlessly strive for better, but not at the cost of the customer. We act with humility and optimism, respecting ideas big and small. We value diversity and voices of all volumes. We are a global organization but keep our feet on the ground, so we can act fast and stay simple. Our teams also have the chance to give back on a local level and make a difference through our corporate social responsibility program, Expedia Cares.

If you have a desire to make a difference with one of the most loved consumer brands in the world and to work in the dynamic travel industry, this is the job for you.

Our family of travel brands includes: Brand Expedia®, Hotels.com®, Expedia® Partner Solutions, Egencia®, trivago®, VRBO®, Orbitz®, Travelocity®, Wotif®, lastminute.com.au®, ebookers®, CheapTickets®, Hotwire®, Classic Vacations®, Expedia® Media Solutions, CarRentals.comTM, Expedia Local Expert®, Expedia® CruiseShipCenters®, SilverRail Technologies, Inc., ALICE and Traveldoo®.