Team Lead/Principal NLP engineer

Social Discovery Group (SDG) is the 3rd largest social discovery company in the world, uniting 60+ brands with 500 million users. We solve the problems of loneliness, isolation, and disconnection by transforming virtual intimacy into the new normal. Our portfolio includes online communication platforms focusing on AI, game mechanics, and video streaming - Dating.com, DateMyAge, Cupid Media, Dil Mil, Kiseki, and others. 

SDG invests in IT startups around the world. Our investments include Open AI, Patreon, Flo, Clubhouse, Woebot, Flure, Astry, Coursera, Academia.edu, and many others.

We bring together a team of like-minded people and IT professionals specializing in the creation and development of globally impactful social discovery products. Our international team of 1200 professionals and digital nomads works all over the world. 

Our teams of digital nomads work remotely from Cyprus, Malta, the USA, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Montenegro, Poland, Latvia, Serbia, Spain, Portugal, UAE,  Israel, Turkey, Thailand, Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia and many other locations. 

In August 2024, we achieved Great Place to Work US Certification™! This achievement reflects our core belief that a truly exceptional workplace is built on trust, pride, and camaraderie—not just great perks.

We are looking for a Team Lead/Principal NLP Engineer to join one of our investment products in the Conversational AI field.

Our product consists of virtual partners for interactive communication and flirting. These are customizable characters that users can interact with on any topic, including the most intimate ones, using text, voice messages, photos, and videos. Full confidentiality is our top priority.

We aim to improve the quality of communication between bots and users. The main goal is to optimize the relevance and engagement of dialogues, as well as to increase the average transaction value.

Your main tasks will be:

• Develop and enhance the architecture of ML services to achieve high performance;
• Set up model training processes: accelerating language models, alignment, and improving bot memory;
• Collect and prepare data for training models;
• Participate in the deployment and implementation of ML solutions;
• Act as the Head of AI when needed: manage processes, organize team workflows, and interact with senior management.

We expect from you:

• Practical experience in implementing complex NLP projects;
• Knowledge of mathematical algorithms for ML, key model types, and their evaluation criteria;
• Extensive experience in NLP: LLM, DPO, RLHF, Pretraining, Finetuning, LoRA;
• Ability to build pipelines independently;
• Excellent knowledge of Python and popular libraries (Scikit-learn, Pandas, Matplotlib, Numpy, Scipy);
• Experience working with PyTorch and Transformers;
• Proficient in Linux/Unix and Git;
• Knowledge of CV-related topics is a strong plus (e.g., generative models: diffusion, text-to-image, text-to-video).

What do we offer:

• REMOTE OPPORTUNITY to work full time;
• Vacation 28 calendar days per year;
• 7 wellness days per year (time off) that can be used to deal with household issues, to lie down and recover without taking sick leave;
• Bonuses up to $5000 for recommending successful applicants for positions in the company;
• Full payment for professional training, international conferences and meetings;
• Corporate discount for English lessons;
• ​Health benefits. If you are not eligible for corporate medical insurance, the company will compensate you with up to $ 1,000 gross per year per employee, according to the paychecks. This can be spent on self-purchase of health insurance or on doctor’s fees for yourself and close relatives (spouse, children);
• ​Workplace organization. The company provides all employees with an equipped workplace and all the necessary equipment (table, armchair, wifi, etc.) in our offices or co-working locations. In the other locations, the company provides reimbursement of workplace costs up to $ 1000 gross once every 3 years, according to the paychecks. This money can be spent on the rent of the co-working room, on equipping the working place at home (desk, chair, Internet, etc.) during those 3 years;
• Internal gamified gratitude system: receive bonuses from colleagues and exchange them for time off, merch, team building activities, massage certificates, etc. 

Sounds good? Join us now!