Staff Machine Learning Engineer - Alt

📋 Description

• • Alt is at the forefront of unlocking the immense value within the alternative assets market, beginning with the dynamic $5 billion trading card industry. We provide collectors with a comprehensive, all-in-one platform to seamlessly buy, sell, vault, and finance their valuable cards. Our innovative approach has garnered significant backing from industry leaders such as Stripe, Coinbase, and Seven Seven Six, as well as endorsements from renowned athletes like Tom Brady and Giannis Antetokounmpo. Our immediate strategic focus is on developing real-time pricing capabilities at an unprecedented scale – the Alt Value – which will serve as the foundational engine for every trade, loan, and product offered on our platform.
• • Are you a highly skilled and motivated Machine Learning Engineer eager to take ownership of the critical engine that drives a rapidly growing startup? In this pivotal role, you will be entrusted with the responsibility of managing and evolving Alt's core card pricing model. This model is the indispensable mechanism that automates our cash advance decisions, underpins our robust risk assessment framework, and delivers the precise card valuations that collectors depend on for their market research and investment strategies.
• • You will leverage your deep expertise in both data science and machine learning operations (ML Ops) to not only enhance model accuracy but also to optimize our underlying infrastructure, ensuring it is both scalable and cost-effective. This is an opportunity to make a profound impact on a business-critical system, shaping its future and potentially building a team around your expertise.
• • Your primary responsibilities will include:
• • Optimizing our existing pricing model to achieve significant reductions in infrastructure costs while simultaneously maintaining and, where possible, improving its accuracy. Special attention will be given to ensuring high accuracy for high-value cards, which are crucial for our platform's growth and user trust.
• • Iterating on and refining our underwriting model. The goal here is to maximize the value of cash advance disbursements offered to our users, all while rigorously maintaining our target risk thresholds and minimizing default rates. This involves a delicate balance of enabling user liquidity and safeguarding the company's financial health.
• • Leading the entire machine learning lifecycle. This encompasses everything from initial model training and sophisticated feature generation to seamless production deployment and continuous, proactive monitoring. You will be the architect and guardian of our ML models in production.
• • Collaborating closely with our team of Expert Pricers. By immersing yourself in their domain knowledge of the trading card market, you will gain invaluable insights that will directly inform and drive model improvements, creating a powerful synergy between human expertise and algorithmic intelligence.
• • Owning the model's AWS infrastructure. This includes writing and maintaining the code for our pricing API, ensuring the model can serve predictions at scale with ultra-low latency, meeting the demands of a high-frequency trading environment.
• • This role is an exceptional fit for individuals who:
• • Possess a genuine passion for trading cards or a similar alternative asset class, coupled with a strong desire to delve deeply into the nuances of the domain.
• • Are hands-on, individual contributors who thrive in a dynamic, zero-to-one startup environment where initiative and execution are paramount.
• • Seek to own a business-critical system and are excited by the prospect of building and leading a team around their expertise in the future.
• • Demonstrate a pragmatic approach, preferring to build effective solutions to specific problems rather than overhauling entire systems unnecessarily.
• • Exhibit high curiosity and a relentless desire to learn and grow within a fast-paced, evolving industry.