Senior AI/ML Engineer - Remote

Optum Tech is a global leader in health care innovation. Our teams develop cutting-edge solutions that help people live healthier lives and help make the health system work better for everyone. From advanced data analytics and AI to cybersecurity, we use innovative approaches to solve some of health care's most complex challenges. Your contributions here have the potential to change lives. Ready to build the next breakthrough? Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

Optum AI is UnitedHealth Group's enterprise AI team. We are AI/ML scientists and engineers with deep expertise in AI/ML engineering for health care. We develop AI/ML solutions for the highest impact opportunities across UnitedHealth Group businesses including UnitedHealthcare, Optum Financial, Optum Health, Optum Insight, and Optum Rx.  

We are seeking a self-motivated and proactive individual to drive the development and implementation of AI-based tools and workflows. You will collaborate closely with research, engineering, and product teams to translate cutting-edge AI advancements into production-ready capabilities. The ideal candidate consistently seeks opportunities to enhance system performance and contribute to organizational objectives, while upholding ethical AI principles by embedding fairness, transparency, and accountability throughout the model development lifecycle.

You'll enjoy the flexibility to work remotely * from anywhere within the U.S. as you take on some tough challenges. For all hires in the Minneapolis or Washington, D.C. area, you will be required to work in the office a minimum of four days per week.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Design and implement AI systems for conversational search in medical content
• Evaluate, debug, and improve conversational AI to ensure accuracy and efficiency
• Monitor and optimize system performance for latency, cost, and reliability
• Explore and apply reinforcement learning and self-improving techniques
• Collaborate and communicate effectively with cross-functional teams and stakeholders to deliver scalable solutions
• Ensure responsible and ethical AI practices throughout all stages of development
• Stay up-to-date with advances in AI/ML and actively contribute ideas, research, or solutions to improve team and product capabilities
• Collaborate with research, engineering, and product teams to translate cutting-edge AI advancements into production-ready capabilities. Uphold ethical AI principles by embedding fairness, transparency, and accountability throughout the model development lifecycle

You'll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.

Required Qualifications:

• Graduate degree in computer Science or similar fields
• 4+ years of hands-on experience in AI/ML, with a solid focus on natural language processing (NLP) and Language Models
• 3+ years of experience with libraries such as Langchain, OpenAI API, Hugging Face Transformers, or similar tools for finetuning and integrating LLMs
• Experience with agentic frameworks such as LangGraph, AutoGen, Bedrock, or Vertex AI, demonstrated by contributing to projects involving the design of modular and scalable AI agents

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience deploying agentic systems in production environments, ensuring scalability, reliability, and performance
• Experience with RL training for language models
• Experience working on collaborative software projects using GitHub
• Proven ability to engage in AI/ML research, evidenced by peer-reviewed publications or technical reports, and by incorporating recent advances in NLP and agentic frameworks into product-led projects

*All employees working remotely will be required to adhere to UnitedHealth Group's Telecommuter Policy.

Pay is based on several factors including but not limited to local labor markets, education, work experience, certifications, etc. In addition to your salary, we offer benefits such as, a comprehensive benefits package, incentive and recognition programs, equity stock purchase and 401k contribution (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). No matter where or when you begin a career with us, you'll find a far-reaching choice of benefits and incentives. The salary for this role will range from $91,700 to $163,700 annually based on full-time employment. We comply with all minimum wage laws as applicable.

Application Deadline: This will be posted for a minimum of 2 business days or until a sufficient candidate pool has been collected. Job posting may come down early due to volume of applicants.

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone-of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income-deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes - an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.

UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer under applicable law and qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, national origin, religion, age, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by local, state, or federal laws, rules, or regulations.

UnitedHealth Group is a drug - free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.

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