LLM Research Engineer

You will join our Applied Research team, working at the intersection of large-scale AI systems and the financial sector. Our goal is to design, fine-tune, and optimize foundation models—transformers, LLMs, and multi-modal architectures—to address complex challenges to "Help Everyone Home". This role combines cutting-edge ML research with hands-on implementation in production environments, in close collaboration with ML engineers, data engineers, and financial domain experts.

About the role

• Analyze and process large-scale structured, unstructured, and multi-modal financial datasets.

• Fine-tune, adapt, evaluate, and optimize foundation models (LLMs, multi-modal transformers) for financial applications.

• Design experiments, evaluate models using statistical metrics and domain-specific benchmarks, and implement continuous improvement methods.

• Develop and integrate retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipelines and embedding-based search for enhanced contextual relevance.

• Apply advanced feature engineering, prompt engineering, and bias mitigation techniques to improve model performance and fairness.

• Collaborate with domain experts to translate business problems into AI model objectives and solutions.

• Deploy research prototypes into production in partnership with engineering teams.

• Create visualizations and reports to communicate findings clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

• Establish and promote best practices for training, evaluation, and deployment of foundation models in the financial sector.

• Collaborate with the engineering and product teams to develop and support our internal data platform to support ongoing analyses

About you

• Master’s or PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Statistics, or related field, or equivalent applied experience.

• Strong foundation in ML/DL theory and hands-on experience with foundation models (transformers, large language models, multi-modal architectures).

• Proficiency in Python and ML frameworks (PyTorch or TensorFlow).

• Experience with training, fine-tuning, and evaluating large models on GPUs/TPUs.

• Solid understanding of NLP techniques, embeddings, and RAG architectures.

• Experience with MLOps tools for experiment tracking, model versioning, and deployment.

• Strong knowledge of data preprocessing and feature engineering for both structured (tabular) and unstructured (text, images, documents) financial data.

What you’ll get

Our team members fuel our strategy, innovation and growth, so we ensure the health and well-being of not just you, but your family, too! We go above and beyond to give you the support you need on an individual level and offer all sorts of ways to help you live your best life. We are proud to offer eligible team members perks and health benefits that will help you have peace of mind. Simply put: We’ve got your back. Check out our full list of Benefits and Perks.

About us

Rocket Innovation Studio (RIS) launched in 2019 and has gone on to make its mark in the Canadian fintech industry. Headquartered at 156 Chatham Street in Windsor, Ontario, the company renovated the historic building which began as an auto showroom and garage before becoming a furniture store, the Old Fish Market, the Coach and Horses Pub, and the Loop.
 

With the backing of Rocket Companies®, RIS is able to capitalize on the creativity and growth of a startup environment with the stability and enterprise experience of a mature company. At RIS, Canadian talent is able to collaborate, design, build, test and return a full range of custom IT solutions. RIS is leading the charge to make Windsor Canada's tech hub. Apply today to join a team that offers career growth, amazing benefits and the chance to work with leading industry professionals.

This job description is an outline of the primary responsibilities of this position and may be modified at the discretion of the company at any time.  Decisions related to employment are not based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, military or veteran status or any other characteristic protected by state or federal law.  The company provides reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities in accordance with applicable state and federal laws.  Applicants requiring reasonable accommodations in completing the application and/or participating in the application process should contact a member of the Human Resources team, at [email protected].

This posting is for an existing vacancy for a Data Scientist at Rocket Innovation Studio.  The compensation for this position is $103,250.00-$153,250.00.  The position may also be eligible for an annual bonus, incentives, and other employment-related benefits including, but not limited to, medical, dental, and vision benefits, retirement plan, and paid time off.  More information regarding these benefits and others can be found here.  The information regarding compensation and other benefits included in this paragraph is only an estimate and is subject to revision from time to time as the Company, in its sole and exclusive discretion, deems appropriate. The Company may determine during its review of the proposed compensation and benefits provided for this position, that the compensation and benefits for such position should be reduced. In no event will the Company reduce the compensation for the position to a level below the applicable jurisdictional minimum wage rate for the position.

Our Talent Acquisition team uses artificial intelligence to assist in screening, assessing, or selecting applicants. Our hiring process is never completely automated and uses AI in conjunction with our recruiting and talent acquisition professionals.