Data Scientist

About Us:

At Parafin, our mission is to grow small businesses.

Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, yet banks do not have their back. Parafin is a technology company that builds infrastructure which enables small businesses to get easy access to financial services via platforms they sell on. Parafin's first set of products offer capital-as-a-service for online platforms. Parafin currently powers the capital programs for platforms and payment processors ranging from Series B to post-IPO companies such as DoorDash, Amazon, Worldpay, Mindbody, Fullsteam, Guesty, Xplor, and Quilt.

We are a tight-knit team coming from organizations such as Stripe, Square, Plaid, Coinbase, Robinhood, Affirm, Uber, and CERN, and are excited both about helping small businesses grow and thrive, and build products that leaders at top companies have started to use every day to grow their platforms. We are backed by prominent venture capitalists such as Ribbit Capital, Thrive Capital, GIC, Index Ventures, Green Oaks Capital, and SV Angel and have raised more than $94M in equity and $200M in debt.

The Data Science Team 

Our Impact  

Data is core to Parafin’s mission to grow small businesses. Our platform partnerships and portfolio provide rich insight into SMB financial health, allowing us to create fair, automated, and broad access to financial services. As Parafin scales, the breadth and depth of our data grows with it, amplifying the impact we can have on customers and the trajectory of the business. 

Our Team 

Enthusiasm, skepticism, and respect for data are in our DNA – two of our co-founders were PhD data scientists at Robinhood. Since our founding, we have grown the team to include perspectives from graduate studies in physics, mathematics, bioengineering, economics, financial engineering, and electrical engineering and professional experience at Robinhood, Uber, Lyft, Airbnb, Faire, Segment, Facebook, and Google. We value first-principles thinking, attention to detail, and craftsmanship.  

Our Work
Our mission is to help Parafin succeed by leveraging the vast data that powers our platform. Our team partners closely with leaders across the company to drive impact. Our scope includes:  

Go-To-Market: We collaborate with our sales leaders to convey the value of embedded finance to prospective partners. Example projects:

• Identifying the impact of financial access on platform GMV using quasi-random variation

• Running simulations to assess the risk of offering financial products on specific platforms

Portfolio Monitoring and Servicing: We develop tooling to maintain portfolio health, driving sustainable growth for Parafin, our capital markets partners, and the small businesses we serve. Example projects:

• Estimating survival curves to predict cohorted loss rates

• Deploying LLM-based models to automatically identify bankruptcy from web data 

Product and Growth: We drive strategic decision-making and product design at the highest levels of the company. Example projects:

• Designing experiments to increase offer size for low-risk merchants

• Building tools to instrument and diagnose user behavior in our application flow 

Underwriting: We build models and systems to decide which SMBs receive offers for each financial product and on what terms. Example projects:

• Training a quantile regression model to forecast the distribution of SMB revenues and precisely size our financing offers 

• Applying convex optimization to generate competitive financing offers 

Beyond these focus areas, our team helps expand our impact by recruiting exceptional talent, improving our tools, and supporting each other through regular seminars and project reviews.

About You 

Your Impact 

You will make an outsized impact on Parafin’s trajectory by leading projects from end to end. You will quickly learn new methods, apply them across diverse areas of the business, and implement them robustly. You will develop expertise in specific areas of the business, but may tackle projects across domains as our priorities evolve. 

Your Background and Skills 

Bachelor's Degree (or higher) in Computer Science, Statistics, Mathematics, Data Science (or related fields). We believe the most effective data scientists bring the following skills to their work:

• Statistical Reasoning 

  • Approach data analysis with a critical, intellectually honest eye   

  • Design concise metrics that guide decision making 

  • Use robust causal inference methods 

  • Develop valid and predictive machine learning models

• Business Acumen 

  • Identify and effectively prioritize business problems

  • Solve business problems using appropriate data science techniques

  • Anticipate the impact of your work on our financial performance, customers, and compliance obligations  

• Engineering Mindset 

  • Write legible, reliable, and tested code 

  • Build or source tools to boost the team’s efficiency

  • Contribute to model and data infrastructure design

• Leadership and Collaboration 

  • Model Parafin’s values of efficiency, intellectual honesty, accountability, and empathy 

  • Build trusted relationships with stakeholders 

  • Document work, seek feedback, and share learnings proactively 

• Focused Execution 

  • Prioritize high-impact use of your time 

  • Scope projects rigorously  

  • Act with urgency
    

What We Offer

• Salary $190k- $220k + EQ
  Senior Level Salary $220k- 250k + EQ

• Equity grant

• Medical, dental & vision insurance

• Unlimited PTO & work from home flexibility

• Commuter benefits

• Free lunches

• Paid parental leave

• 401(k)

• Employee assistance program

If you require reasonable accommodation in completing this application, interviewing, completing any pre-employment testing, or otherwise participating in the employee selection process, please contact us.