Director Machine Learning Jobs in California (NOW HIRING)

The opportunity
Unity Vector represents the next generation of our AI-powered advertising ecosystem-a forward-looking evolution of our machine learning infrastructure and models. We are seeking a visionary Director of Machine Learning to lead our User Value team, a group at the heart of Unity's ambitious machine learning modeling initiatives.
As a leader, you will bridge the gap between complex machine learning paradigms and core product strategy. You will manage and scale a high-performing organization of scientists and ML engineers, ensuring our models translate into high-value user acquisition for advertisers.
What You'll Do

• Shape the ML Vision: Define 1-3 year technical roadmap for user value modeling, aligning algorithmic capabilities with product and business growth goals.
• Lead and Scale Teams: Mentor, recruit, and retain a team of applied scientists and machine learning engineers. Foster a culture of technical excellence, continuous learning, and rapid experimentation.
• Drive Product Impact: Partner closely with leadership in Product, Design, and Data Science to identify new opportunities where ML can solve customer pain points and unlock tangible value.
• Advance the Technical Stack: Oversee the development, deployment, and maintenance of scalable ML systems-spanning personalization, content recommendation, multi-task learning, reinforcement learning, and large language model (LLM) integration-ensuring high availability and low latency.
• Balance Innovation and Execution: Establish rigorous frameworks for A/B testing, model evaluation, and guardrails to ensure algorithmic changes measurably improve customer trust and retention without introducing regression.

What We're Looking For

• Proven Leadership: 8+ years of experience in machine learning and software engineering, with 4+ years of experience managing teams
• Domain Expertise: A strong track record of shipping ML systems at scale, specifically in areas like personalization, recommendation system, information retrieval, or behavioral modeling.
• Product-Minded Engineering: A deep understanding of how technical ML metrics (e.g., accuracy, NDCG, precision-recall) connect to macro user and business metrics (e.g., retention, lifetime value).
• Strategic Communication: Ability to articulate complex technical concepts clearly to non-technical executives and cross-functional partners.
• Technical Foundations: An advanced degree (MS or PhD) in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Statistics, or a related quantitative field, or equivalent practical experience.

Gross pay annually, Mountain View, SF/Bay: $250,300 - $325,400
This range reflects the anticipated base salary for this position. Beyond base salary, this role may be eligible for equity awards and participation in our company incentive plans (such as annual discretionary bonuses or sales commissions). The final offer amount will depend on several factors, including geographic location and the candidate's relevant experience, professional background, and skill set.
Benefits
At Unity, we want our team members to thrive. We offer a wide range of benefits designed to support well-being and work-life balance.
Please note: Benefits eligibility, specific offerings, and coverage vary based on the country and employment status.
While specific benefits vary, here are some of the ways we strive to take care of our eligible team members globally: Comprehensive health, life, and disability insurance | Commute subsidy | Employee stock ownership | Competitive retirement/pension plans | Generous vacation and personal days | Support for new parents through leave and family-care programs | Office food snacks | Mental Health and Wellbeing programs and support | Employee Resource Groups | Global Employee Assistance Program | Training and development programs | Volunteering and donation matching program
Life at Unity
Unity [NYSE: U] is the world's leading game engine, powering play for more than 3 billion consumers each month. The top mobile games in the world, the most played PC indie titles, the most innovative console games, and virtually all of the top XR and Web Games are developed, deployed, and grown in Unity. Unity also enables teams across industries like automotive, manufacturing, and healthcare to design, simulate, and collaborate in 3D - closing the gap between ideas and reality. For more information, please visit www.unity.com.
Unity is a proud equal opportunity employer. We are committed to fostering an inclusive, innovative environment and celebrate our employees across age, race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, disability, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or any other protected status in accordance with applicable law. Our differences are strengths that enable us to support the growing and evolving needs of our customers, partners, and collaborators. If you have a disability that means there are preparations or accommodations we can make to help ensure you have a comfortable and positive interview experience, please fill out this form to let us know.
This position requires the incumbent to have a sufficient knowledge of English to have professional verbal and written exchanges in this language since the performance of the duties related to this position requires frequent and regular communication with colleagues and partners located worldwide and whose common language is English.
This posting is intended to fill an existing vacancy, and we are committed to providing applicants with updates throughout the hiring process in accordance with applicable law.
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