Global Data Scientist Nutrition

UNILEVER IS LOOKING FOR A Global Data Scientist Nutrition

Salary:  44-68 K gross per year depending on background and experience.

Location: Hive, Wageningen (Netherlands).

Local conditions apply

Full-time

The applicant must have the right to work in the Netherlands.

For the recruitment of this position, we would like to emphasize that local conditions apply to the position and for this vacancy in principle we will first consider candidates based in the Netherlands. If you are based outside of the Netherlands and you are interested to apply, please feel free to do so but we can only take your application on if a decision is made to also recruit outside of the Netherlands.

ABOUT UNILEVER

With 3.4 billion people in over 190 countries using our products every day, Unilever is a business that makes a real impact on the world. Work on brands that are loved and improve the lives of our consumers and the communities around us. We are driven by our purpose: to make sustainable living commonplace, and it is our belief that doing business the right way drives superior performance. At the heart of what we do is our people – we believe that when our people work with purpose, we will create a better business and a better world. 

At Unilever, your career will be a unique journey, grounded in our inclusive, collaborative, and flexible working environment. We don’t believe in the ‘one size fits all’ approach and instead we will equip you with the tools you need to shape your own future.

ABOUT FOODS R&D

Foods is the largest Business Group (BG) in Unilever with global multibillion-dollar brands such as Knorr and Hellman’s and many strong regional and local brands. Foods BG’s vision is to be a world-class force for good in food. Foods R&D develops and delivers unmissably superior products and solutions that are Boldly Healthier for People and Planet, rooted in differentiated science and technology. With our global innovation centre Hive, in the heart of the Silicon Valley of Food, in Wageningen, The Netherlands, and our network of R&D teams across the world, we work closely with many internal and external partners to create market-winning innovations. Increasingly, Digital and Data are the currency of how we work in R&D, from discovery through product development and deployment. New developments in AI and Data Science will be the crucial differentiator for us to win.

ABOUT ECO SYSTEMS, DIGITAL AND DATA (ED&D) TEAM

The ED&D capability is the central team in Global Foods R&D for Unilever. Its purpose is to enable and lead the digital transformation of our organization. Our core expertise area and responsibility lie in providing the systems expertise and user solutions to drive data quality in our core ingredient and product specifications. Increasingly, we are also strengthening our capability in data engineering, visualization, data analytics and data science to extract the maximum value from the data we have and utilize it to support the in-silico design agenda. The capability team is working closely together with many teams across Foods R&D, ranging from regional or local deploy teams to global capability teams on various applications. It is a diverse team (age, experience, background, nationalities) driving Digital Transformation in Unilever Foods R&D.

JOB PURPOSE

Unilever is the place where you can bring your purpose to life with the work that you do – creating a better business and a better world. Within Foods R&D, ED&D Capability team we are looking for a Global Data Scientist, with strong expertise in data science, modeling, optimization and/or Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The key features of this role are to:

• Explore, experiment and apply state-of-the-art modeling/AI techniques to enable the achievement of business targets

• Facilitate the transition towards complete data driven decision making and enabling the organization’s digital transformation

• Promote a culture of modeling and analytics for differentiation and competitive advantage

WHAT WILL YOUR MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES BE

• Identifying opportunities and proposing projects for business growth, productivity and automation through data science and modeling

• Translating business needs into technical requirements for the model development

• Extract value from data from multiple sources including SAP PLM, R&D Datalake, existing Power BI datasets and individual datasets provided by business partners

• Lead end-to-end project delivery focused on data extraction or generation, data transformation, model development, testing and deployment

• Choosing the right tools, infrastructure, algorithms to address the business challenge and communicating these decisions effectively to leaders and stakeholders

• Collaborating with application developers to deploy the models for end-users

• Advise functional R&D teams with your expertise on data modelling to add value to the projects that you are a part of from automation, predictive analysis and data generation perspectives.

• Collaborate with the System Expertise teams (maintain SAP PLM, DataLake, DataLab, etc. in-house systems) to create unlocks for model development

• External and internal eco-system partner exploration against required capabilities to expand the team’s collaboration

• Stay informed about the latest advancements in (generative or otherwise) AI research and lead initiatives to pilot new techniques into the development process

• Spread awareness on these AI developments amongst the team members to aid the process of maintaining a state-of-the-art capability

• Develop comprehensive documentation of the developed models to facilitate knowledge transfer

WHAT YOU NEED TO SUCCEED

Experiences & Qualifications

• Master’s degree or higher in data science, applied mathematics, statistics or related fields.

• Experience with data-based model development and optimization

• Experience with deep learning, machine learning (supervised or un-supervised)

• Experience/Interest in Generative AI is highly desirable

• Experience with data visualization and dashboard tools is a plus.

• Any further R&D or x-functional business experience (e.g. Supply Chain, etc.) is a plus

Skills

• Proficiency in Python or R along with the relevant libraries for data science (for e.g. numpy, pandas, tensorflow, pytorch, xgboost, scikit, etc.)

• Experience of working with varied sources of data as highlighted in the responsibilities section

• Experience building and refining model pipelines from data curation to evaluation and final deployment

• Experience and understanding of Design of Experiments (DOE’s) is desirable

• Experience with optimization algorithms is desirable

• Experience in developing natural language processing (NLP) based solutions is desirable

• Experience in Generative AI model architectures for retrieval-augmented generation, agentic-based systems, etc. is highly desirable

• Proficiency in SQL is highly desirable

• Experience using PowerBI is desirable

• Experience in using AzureML and/or Databricks is a plus

• Experience in using Azure Devops for documentation, repository management, etc. is a plus

Capabilities

• Fluent in English, strong verbal and written communication skills

• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with attention to detail are essential

• Critical thinking and flexibility to work effectively around technical and business constraints.

• Ability to communicate expert modeling-related work in “different languages” based on the target audience: stakeholders, experts, R&D community

• Demonstrated teamwork and collaboration skills. Be able to work effectively in multi-functional, multi-cultural and multi-located teams.

• Passion for continuous learning to grow the subject matter expertise and to continuously bring value. 

WHAT IS IN IT FOR YOU?

Unilever is the place where you can be yourself and bring your purpose to life with the work that you do – creating a better business and a better world. We offer an exciting & dynamic work environment where you can make things happen. Furthermore, we offer some great reward and benefits!

• Attractive total remuneration package; excellent company pension, bonus, share scheme.

• Flexible cross-disciplinary career opportunities and a wealth of training opportunities & wellbeing resources whenever and wherever.

• Plenty of company-paid holidays to further ensure your work-life balance is maintained.

• We encourage an inclusive culture, which comes to life with interchangeable public holidays, paid paternity leave of 6 weeks and our transgender policy.

• Under the Hybrid Working principles, you will be expected to spend a minimum of 40%-60% in the office or at customers, suppliers or partners to connect and collaborate.  For the time you work from home, we will ensure you are well equipped. When you are at the office , you can enjoy our tasty canteen with prepped food and own products.

• Informal culture and being the first one trying our new products. 

• My Fitness Plan (reduction on your Fitness Subscription).

• Home work allowance

• Company laptop and mobile phone

• Green Mobility Policy.   

EXCITED?

Join Unilever and our team! To apply, you must do so online. Please do not forget to upload your CV and a motivation letter.  Your application will be reviewed against our requirements and we will be in touch shortly after the closing date to provide you with an update on the status of your application.

Looking forward to meeting you! 

Please note this is a Direct Search led by Unilever. Applications from agencies will not be accepted, nor will fees be paid for unsolicited CVs.

Equal Opportunity Employer: Unilever is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regards to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, disability, age, parenthood, pregnancy or any other basis protected by applicable law, and will not be discriminated against. 

By highlighting the gender diversity at the workplace, Unilever encourages women equally men to apply. If you look for a job after a long career break or after any type of leave, do not hesitate to apply.

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