Whisker · 13 hours ago
Staff Machine Learning Engineer
Auburn Hills, MI
Full-time
Onsite
Lead/Staff
15+ years expWhisker is redefining what it means to live with cats by designing intelligent systems that enhance the experience of cat ownership. The Staff Machine Learning Engineer will lead the design, development, and deployment of AI and machine learning models, ensuring their scalability and performance while providing mentorship to engineering and data science teams.
Consumer GoodsPetConsumer
Responsibilities
Leads the end-to-end architecture of production AI systems, including data pipelines, feature engineering, model training, evaluation, deployment, and inference, ensuring scalability, performance, and alignment with Whisker’s business objectives
Builds and ships AI models, contributing hands-on code across data preparation, model development, training workflows, and inference services, setting a high bar for production-quality AI engineering
Partners closely with product, data, and engineering leaders to translate business and customer needs into applied AI solutions, balancing model accuracy, latency, cost, and operational reliability
Provides technical leadership and mentorship across AI, data science, and software engineering teams, establishing best practices for model development, MLOps, testing, deployment, and ongoing model maintenance
Evaluates, prototypes, and recommends emerging AI and ML technologies, frameworks, and tooling that accelerate model development, improve production robustness, and advance Whisker’s AI capabilities
Ensures the integrity, security, and reliability of AI systems, including data governance, model versioning, monitoring, drift detection, and responsible AI practices throughout the lifecycle
Owns the full AI development lifecycle, from problem framing and experimentation through production deployment, monitoring, iteration, and continuous improvement of AI-powered products
Conducts regular code reviews and provides constructive feedback to ensure code quality
Designs, develop, lead implementation of robust, scalable security solutions across multiple platforms
Will perform additional responsibilities when required
Qualification
Required
Bachelor's, Master's degree or PhD in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field
15+ years of professional experience in Software Engineering
5+ years of proven experience as a software architect, demonstrating successful design, release and delivery of complex, scalable systems
5+ years of experience with Amazon S3
5+ years of experience with DynamoDB
4+ years of experience with AWS Lambda
3+ years of experience with IoT Core
2+ years of experience with Timestream
In-depth understanding of software design principles, patterns, and best practices
Expertise in Java, Python, or C++, particularly for complex, function-oriented software that interfaces with IoT devices
Experience supporting medium to large-scale, highly available, service-oriented, distributed production systems
Proficiency with object-oriented programming concepts, patterns and problem decomposition
Experience with cloud platforms, microservices architecture, and a strong grasp of system integration
Excellent problem-solving skills and the ability to address technical challenges in a dynamic environment
Strong leadership, communication, and interpersonal skills
Proficient in using architecture modeling and design tools
Ability to communicate complex technical concepts effectively to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
Project management skills with a track record of successfully driving projects to completion
A passion for staying updated on industry trends and continuously improving technical expertise
Maintains confidentiality of proprietary information
Ability to maintain a professional atmosphere in a fast-paced environment with numerous interactions and interruptions
Ability to establish and maintain cooperative working relationships with Team Members and colleagues
Comfortable with office pets (cats, dogs)
Preferred
Experience with CloudWatch, AppSync, Relational Databases, Kinesis Stream, CloudTrail, API Gateway, Cognito or VPC
Benefits
Premium Medical/Dental/Vision insurance
Paid parental leave
Whisker Parents Program
1 day "pawternity" leave for new pet adoption
Pet Insurance Discount
401K match
Flexible spending accounts
Company-paid short-term disability and life insurance
Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
Generous paid time off
14 Paid Holidays
Top of the line equipment
Pet-friendly office
Whisker products and swag
Continuing education Support
On-site gym with Peloton
Referral program
Company
Whisker
Maker of the highest-rated automatic, self-cleaning litter box on the market, used by more than 1,000,000 pet parents.
501-1000 employees
H1B Sponsorship
Whisker has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships. Please note that this does not
guarantee sponsorship for this specific role. Below presents additional info for your
reference. (Data Powered by US Department of Labor)
Distribution of Different Job Fields Receiving Sponsorship
Represents job field similar to this job
Trends of Total Sponsorships
2025 (7)
2024 (6)
2023 (1)
2022 (2)
2021 (1)
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
$31MKey Investors
Pondera Holdings
2019-12-01Private Equity· $31M
Leadership Team
Jacob Zuppke 🐈
President & CEO
Jeannette Conner
Senior EA to the CEO
Recent News
Company data provided by crunchbase