Machine Learning Engineer (PhD)

Akur8 is a young, dynamic, fast growing Insurtech startup that is transforming insurance pricing and reserving with transparent machine learning.

Our SaaS platform leverages the power of transparent machine learning and predictive analytics to inject game-changing speed, performance and reliability into insurers’ pricing and reserving processes.

Powered by skilled R&D, Product & Actuarial teams we’ve developed unique AI algorithms that automate the insurance pricing and reserving in an unprecedented way.

This results in a pricing solution which not only allows insurance companies to model their risks 10 times faster, with a higher predictive power than traditional methods, but which also incorporates next generation reserving functionalities, helping to predict and legislate for future claims, therefore constituting a major game changer for the insurance industry.

Akur8 has already been selected:

• In CB Insights Top 50 World Insurtech Companies 2023
• In Insurtech Global’s Top 100 AIFinTech list 2023
• In Fintech Global’s Top 100 AIFinTech list 2023
• As No.24 in Sønr’s World Top 100 Insurtech Companies 2022
• As 3rd best overall (worldwide) in the CodinGame 2022 Software Engineering Fall Challenge

With 35 nationalities within our team, and offices in Paris, London, New York, Tokyo, Milan, Cologne, Atlanta and Montréal, Akur8's solution is international by design. 

Servicing more than 250+ clients across 4 continents and targeting all non-life insurance carriers, we focus on more mature markets for faster expansion.

To learn more about Akur8, and what we do, click here.

Akur8 is, in all senses of the term, an equal opportunities employer. Akur8 puts diversity, equality and inclusion at the heart of its values. We examine all applications based on equal skills and applying the principles of non-discrimination.

We are looking for a talented Engineer with a strong interest in Software Engineering and Machine Learning to join us and contribute to the development of our actuarial pricing platform. 

Your mission will be to build and implement technical features in the software and optimize its data structures.

These features answer clear business purposes for insurance Risk Managers and Product Managers, meaning that a good understanding of modelling, maths and logic are necessary for the accomplishment of the mission.

At Akur8 our Python, Java and Angular stack leverages the AWS cloud in order to solve the machine learning and insurance pricing problems that our users face on a daily basis.

You’ll be fully involved in the heart of our platform, learning every day and seeing the impact of your work in production.

Amongst your daily responsibilities, you’ll be required to:

• Lead the development of challenging product features
• Interact with the design and product teams to help transform their needs into well-structured tasks that fit into our Agile development framework.
• Design, build, integrate and maintain efficient, reusable and reliable code
• Understand our data models and machine learning algorithms to optimise their computation with the different cloud services within AWS.

Your role in integrating our machine learning with our software, with a focus on robustness and computational performance, will assist in implementing a best-in-class platform that enables insurance companies to reduce their modelling time and premium creation exponentially, whilst at the same time providing the added advantage of improving their predictive power / accuracy.

We're looking for an innovative and rigorous mind that has a solid technical background and a track record of helping their team grow.

• You have just completed or are finishing your PhD in computer science, applied mathematics or related topic;
• You understand client's priorities and have a good sense of urgency to find the right balance between need for fast delivery and code robustness;
• You are interested in machine learning and have good knowledge of maths and/or statistics;
• You have experience in software engineering standards, testing, code reviews and system design;
• Having high-level knowledge of AWS’s main services is a plus (EC2, ECS, RDS, S3, Athena).

Important: You must possess an employment status: French or Schengen area nationality or a ‘carte de séjour’ that will allow you to work from our Paris office. We are equally open to the visa sponsorship of non-EU candidates as long as they are already in possession of their final diploma / attestation of their final academic results.

As a newcomer, you'll be joining a diverse, highly skilled and motivated team, with a strong Tech DNA, colleagues that are eager to share their knowledge and passion.

But it’s not all work, you’ll also be part of a dynamic team that enjoys spending time together and having fun, including karaoke, team lunches, playing sports as well as the occasional ‘happy hour’.

In addition to this, we will provide you with:

• Competitive salary + annual bonus
• Hybrid office / home office policy
• 25 days of paid holidays + RTT
• Gym membership with Gymlib
• On-site gym facilities / corporate sporting activities
• Excellent health insurance (including possibility of family coverage)
• Swile lunch vouchers 
• Public transportation reimbursement + sustainable mobility allowance

• Relocation support
• Sponsored crèche access
• Free cafeteria with fresh fruit, drinks and snacks
• Great office in the heart of the 9th arrondissement of Paris