Microsoft

The Microsoft Bing Web Data Platform’s Document Understanding team is looking for a Principal Applied Scientist in Redmond, WA-an individual contributor to help build cutting-edge solutions for document understanding on a web scale.

The Web Data Platform (WDP) is the data foundation of Bing and many Microsoft experiences, powering Bing Search, ads, Copilot, Grounding API to 1st Party and 3rd Party scenarios, deep research, LLMs (Large Language Models) training, etc.

Our mission is to deliver the world’s freshest, richest, and clean semantic understanding of the web document representation. Our work is central to understanding public web content and advancing the platform’s capabilities in tandem with state-of-the-art modeling. We are at the forefront of applying large-scale machine learning and large language models (LLMs) to understand and enrich web content, fueling critical Microsoft experiences and advancing the frontier of AI.

As part of our team you’ll work with some of the largest datasets. You’ll lead projects end-to-end—from ideation and experimentation to deployment; collaborating across teams to deliver real-world impact through cutting-edge ML and LLM technologies.

We’re a team with proven ability to translate business problems into machine learning solutions.

We are looking for individuals with

• a proven background in natural language processing, information retrieval, or related fields.
• hands-on skills in metrics definition, data labeling, model development, evaluation, model optimization, ship ML to product.
• Foundation in software engineering fundamentals to build scalable, production-ready systems.

Join us to shape the future of AI and deliver meaningful value to millions of users.

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.

• Lead innovation and development of AI models for document understanding, driving their application across critical business scenarios e.g., Search, Copilot, Deep Research Agency, Grounding API, etc.
• Identify and execute opportunities in the Web Data space by applying machine learning at the scale of 100s of Billions of documents to hundreds of billions of documents to enhance quality, freshness, and richness.
• Advance the state-of-the-art through:
  • Defining and refining problem spaces.
  • Scaling high-quality labeled data collection.
  • Innovation in model architecture and design.
  • Exploring novel learning objectives and tasks.
• Drive end-to-end implementation of ML models—from prototyping to optimization and production deployment—at web-scale, processing billions to trillions of documents to deliver measurable business impact.
• Collaborate closely with cross-functional partners across Microsoft to understand shared needs and shape a cohesive technical roadmap to address them.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's Degree in Statistics, Computer Science, or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 6+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Master's Degree in Statistics, Computer Science, or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 4+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Doctorate in Statistics, Computer Science, or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 3+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR equivalent experience.
• 6 years of experience in product development, with a proven background in Software Engineering and Deep Learning
• 1(+) years experience with Large Language Model (LLM) prompts engineering and fine tuning small LLMs.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Ability to think strategically and deliver tangible results with real-world impact.
• Active research engagement in one or more of the following areas: Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Information Retrieval, Machine Learning, or Natural Language Processing.
• Experience with search and recommendation systems.
• Deep understanding of modern ML techniques and architecture.

Applied Sciences IC5 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $139,900 - $274,800 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $188,000 - $304,200 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here: https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay

Microsoft will accept applications for the role until June 18th, 2025.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

Benefits/perks listed below may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Microsoft and the country where you work.

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