Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Recommendation & AI Applications at NewsBreak

<div class="content-intro"><p><strong data-redactor-tag="strong">About NewsBreak</strong></p> <p>Founded in 2015, NewsBreak is the Content Intelligence platform shaping the future content economy. With over 40 million monthly active users, our flagship platform delivers highly personalized local news and information powered by advanced AI, recommendation systems, and adtech.</p> <p>Recognized by&nbsp;<em data-stringify-type="italic">Fast Company</em> as #32 on the Top Workplaces for Innovators, we're proud to be Great Place to Work® certified and home to a dynamic team of technologists, product innovators, and business leaders who are passionate about solving meaningful challenges at scale.</p> <p>Together, we reached unicorn status in 2021, and we remain committed to continuing this high-growth trajectory with the right team to fulfill our mission: building the infrastructure layer for content intelligence.</p> <p>If you’re inspired to dream big, innovate fast, and make a difference, we’d love to hear from you! For more information, visit&nbsp;<a class="c-link" href="http://www.newsbreak.com/about" target="_blank" data-stringify-link="http://www.newsbreak.com/about" data-sk="tooltip_parent">www.newsbreak.com/about</a></p></div><div class="p-rich_text_section"> <p><strong>About the Role</strong></p> <p>We are looking for a <strong>Senior Machine Learning Engineer</strong> to help evolve our <strong>large-scale recommendation systems</strong> and apply <strong>AI / LLM technologies</strong> to real-world production problems.&nbsp;You will work on <strong>core feed, retrieval, and ranking systems</strong> serving tens of millions of users, while also participating in <strong>AI-driven innovation projects</strong> that explore new ways to improve content discovery, personalization, and developer productivity.&nbsp;This role is ideal for engineers who enjoy <strong>strong individual ownership</strong>, hands-on development, and translating ideas into reliable systems.</p> <p><strong>&nbsp;What You’ll Work On</strong></p> <p><em>Large-Scale Recommendation Systems</em></p> <ul> <li>Design, build, and iterate on <strong>high-throughput, low-latency recommendation systems</strong> powering NewsBreak’s core feeds.</li> <li>Improve <strong>retrieval, ranking, and multi-objective optimization</strong> to balance engagement, retention, content quality, and business metrics.</li> <li>Own systems from <strong>offline training → online inference → A/B experimentation → metric analysis</strong>.</li> <li>Identify and resolve issues related to <strong>data quality, model drift, and system performance</strong> in production.</li> </ul> <p><em>AI &amp; LLM Applications</em></p> <ul> <li>Apply <strong>LLMs and foundation models</strong> to recommendation-related problems such as content understanding, user intent modeling, and feature generation.</li> <li>Prototype quickly, validate with experiments, and push successful ideas into production.</li> </ul> <p><em>AI-Driven Development</em></p> <ul> <li>Embrace <strong>AI-assisted development workflows</strong>, including LLM-powered coding, debugging, and analysis.</li> <li>Apply AI across feature ideation, prototyping, and experiment analysis.</li> </ul> <p><em>0 </em>→<em> 1 Innovation</em></p> <ul> <li>Contribute to <strong>0–1 AI-powered projects</strong>, helping take ideas from early exploration to MVP and production.</li> </ul> <p><strong>What We’re Looking For</strong></p> <p><strong>Minimum Qualifications</strong> - 3<strong>+ years of industry experience</strong> building machine learning or recommendation systems in production. - Strong understanding of <strong>recommendation system fundamentals</strong> (ranking, embeddings, user/item modeling, experimentation). - Strong coding skills with <strong>Python / Java / Scala</strong>, and experience with <strong>PyTorch or TensorFlow</strong>. - Experience working with <strong>large-scale data and ML systems</strong> (e.g., Spark, distributed training, real-time inference). - Ability to own features end-to-end and deliver measurable business impact.</p> <p><strong>Bonus / Plus Qualifications</strong> - Production experience applying <strong>AI or LLMs to recommendation systems</strong>. - Experience contributing to <strong>0 → 1 AI or ML-driven products</strong>. - Familiarity with AI-assisted development tools and workflows.</p> <p><strong>Benefits</strong></p> <p>We offer a competitive benefits package:</p> <ul> <li>Health, dental, and vision care for you and your family (100% coverage for employee)</li> <li>Top-tier 401(K) plan with company matching</li> <li>Paid time off and paid holidays</li> <li>FSA, HSA and commuter benefits programs</li> <li>Team activity budget</li> </ul> </div><div class="content-pay-transparency"><div class="pay-input"><div class="description">The US base salary range for this full-time position is listed below. Pay may vary based on a number of factors including job-related skills, level, experience, geographic location and relevant education or training. At NewsBreak, we design our overall rewards package to attract top talents. Depending on the position, the role may also be eligible for discretionary bonus and options. Your recruiter can share more details during the hiring process.</div><div class="title">Annual Base Pay Range</div><div class="pay-range"><span>$195,000</span><span class="divider">&mdash;</span><span>$230,000 USD</span></div></div></div><div class="content-conclusion"><p><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/15apsJLgHq1p5NJR3fzFmdctKX4QIzzf2/edit?usp=sharing&amp;ouid=110601223912453011659&amp;rtpof=true&amp;sd=true" target="_blank">CPRA Privacy Notice for California Candidates</a></p> <p>&nbsp;</p></div>