Machine Learning Engineer

Liftoff is the leading growth acceleration platform for the mobile industry, helping advertisers, publishers, game developers and DSPs scale revenue growth with solutions to market and monetize mobile apps.

Liftoff’s solutions, including Accelerate, Direct, Influence, Monetize, Intelligence, and Vungle Exchange, support over 6,600 mobile businesses across 74 countries in sectors such as gaming, social, finance, ecommerce, and entertainment. Founded in 2012 and headquartered in Redwood City, CA, Liftoff has a diverse, global presence.

At Liftoff, the Supply ARO team is crucial to the success of our Publisher side business. Our team is dedicated to designing and building advanced machine learning models that process over a billion events daily, driving significant impact and value. We are rapidly expanding and are a group of innovative engineers leveraging the latest technology to develop efficient and scalable systems.

If you're passionate about building and scaling low-latency, high-throughput systems and have a keen interest in machine learning, we would love to speak with you!

Location 

This is a remote-first role, requiring:

1. Ability to work Pacific time zone hours.

2. Willingness to travel to Orange County for in-person meetings 1-2 weeks per quarter.

Liftoff is a remote-first company with US hubs in Redwood City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orange County, and NYC. Given that most of the team is based in Orange County, it would be beneficial for the individual to be located in the OC/Los Angeles area for regular in-person meetings at our OC office (Costa Mesa, CA 92626). Most of the local team meets in-office once per week. We are also open to candidates located on the West Coast who are willing to travel regularly (one week per quarter) to the OC office.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and train machine learning algorithms to dynamically identify and prioritize high-value inventories for Real-Time Bidding (RTB) buyers.

• Continuously explore and reassess previously underperforming inventories to capture opportunities when buyer demand shifts positively.

• Utilize existing machine learning infrastructure and enhance it as needed to support optimization goals, ensuring scalability and efficiency for processing high-throughput, low-latency bid requests.

• Design, execute, and oversee experiments to test different optimization strategies, ensuring offline estimations closely mirror online revenue estimations using techniques such as counterfactual estimation and inverse propensity score methods.

• Perform statistical analysis on experiment results to fine-tune algorithms and improve performance.

• Collaborate with other engineering teams to ensure a robust data pipeline, logging, and aggregating data efficiently and effectively, allowing ML models to leverage this data in bidder technology.

• Participate in fostering an “engineering excellence” culture through the adoption of state-of-the-art tools, risk-driven testing, explainable systems, and rigorous code reviews.

Qualifications

• BS/MS degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Mathematics, or a related field.

• 10+ years of total professional technical experience.

  • 5+ years of experience as a Software Engineer.

  • 8+ years of experience leading and executing machine learning projects.

• Deep expertise in machine learning algorithms.

• Extensive practical experience with ML frameworks and libraries.

• Proficiency in at least one of the following programming languages: Python, Go, R, C++, or Java.

• In-depth knowledge of distributed systems and data processing frameworks.

• Strong problem-solving and analytical skills.

• Experience with data visualization tools such as Tableau or Looker.

• Ability to effectively communicate complex technical concepts to both technical and non-technical audiences.

• Highly self-motivated and comfortable working in a dynamic, fast-paced environment.

• Strong passion for learning and contribution to team success.

Preferred Experience

• Experience in the Ad Tech industry.

• Strong mathematical background, particularly in statistics.

• Experience in Data Engineering and Feature Stores.

We use Covey as part of our hiring and / or promotional process for jobs in NYC and certain features may qualify it as an AEDT. As part of the evaluation process we provide Covey with job requirements and candidate submitted applications. We began using Covey Scout for Inbound on January 22, 2024.

Please see the independent bias audit report covering our use of Covey here.

Liftoff is committed to providing and maintaining a work environment where all employees and candidates are treated with dignity and respect and that is free of bias, prejudice, and harassment. Liftoff is further committed to providing an equal employment opportunity for all employees and candidates for employment free from discrimination and harassment on the basis of sex, gender (including sexual harassment, gender harassment, and harassment due to pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, and related conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, gender nonconformity, race, creed, religion, color, national origin, ancestry (including association, affiliation, or participation with persons or activities related to national origin, English-proficiency or accent, or immigration status), physical or mental disability, medical condition(s), genetic information of an individual or family member of the individual, marital or domestic partner status, age, veteran or military status, family care status, requesting or taking pregnancy, parental or disability leave, requesting an accommodation, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law, regulation, or ordinance. All such discrimination and harassment is unlawful and will not be tolerated. Liftoff maintains a continued commitment to equal employment opportunity and expects the full cooperation of all personnel.

Liftoff's Compensation Strategy

Liftoff's compensation strategy includes competitive market rate along with equity and benefits and perks that will give our employees what they need to do their best work. In order to ensure teams are compensated fairly for the work performed, we map out specific levels and take into consideration the cost of labor within each location. Liftoff provides employees a total compensation package of competitive market salaries, equity, health and wellness stipends, medical benefits associated with your country of residence. The base compensation will vary based on location, experience as well as level.

Agency and Third Party Recruiter Notice:

Liftoff does not accept unsolicited resumes from individual recruiters or third-party recruiting agencies in response to job postings. No fee will be paid to third parties who submit unsolicited candidates directly to our hiring managers or Recruiting Team. All candidates must be submitted via our Applicant Tracking System by approved Liftoff vendors who have been expressly requested to make a submission by our Recruiting Team for a specific job opening. No placement fees will be paid to any firm unless such a request has been made by the Liftoff Recruiting Team and such a candidate was submitted to the Liftoff Recruiting Team via our Applicant Tracking System.