---
title: 'Staff Machine Learning Scientist at Dave'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/staff-machine-learning-scientist-dave-united-states-c43bmb1k0t21'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-10-28'
---

# Staff Machine Learning Scientist at Dave

- **Company:** Dave
- **Location:** United States
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** remote
- **Posted:** 2026-10-27
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-10-28
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/dave/b68f96aa-b7bc-4bbc-9b29-4fd87cca84a2

## Job description

Dave vs. Goliath. We’re Dave. Dave is a financial app on a mission to build products that level the financial playing field. It is redefining the financial landscape by leveraging technology to create an affordable, transparent, and user-centric access to liquidity for millions of Americans. As a leading innovator in the U.S. financial services sector, Dave’s digital financial platform offers products designed to meet the credit needs of those underserved by traditional financial institutions. Dave’s offerings include its flagship ExtraCash product, providing members up to $500 within minutes. The company is on track to launch several new product offerings in 2026, including a Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) option.

Dave is focused on serving Americans who are financially vulnerable or living paycheck to paycheck. Dave is leading the charge in creating a new era of credit products that prioritizes speed, affordability, and accessibility, making it the go-to financial partner for those who need it most.

The Opportunity We're looking for a Staff Machine Learning Scientist to shape how Dave builds, evaluates, and governs machine learning models across the business. You'll set technical direction across credit, fraud, marketing, and growth while staying hands-on with high-impact modeling challenges. You'll establish practical governance standards, strengthen how we measure business outcomes, and help teams make better decisions with data. This role offers meaningful autonomy and the opportunity to influence how machine learning supports both our members and Dave's long-term growth.

## What You'll Build and Own

- Shape Dave's modeling strategy across underwriting, collections, fraud, marketing, and growth, influencing architecture, shared infrastructure, and investment priorities.
- Establish model governance standards covering validation, monitoring, risk classification, documentation, change management, and independent review throughout the model lifecycle.
- Build and improve credit models that inform underwriting, collections, and settlement strategies, balancing portfolio performance, profitability, and member outcomes.
- Strengthen responsible modeling practices by partnering with Legal, Compliance, Risk, and sponsor-bank stakeholders to translate regulatory requirements into measurable controls.
- Advance business measurement through meaningful metrics, experimentation, causal inference, and incrementality analysis that inform product and portfolio decisions.
- Develop AI-assisted workflows and mentor scientists to improve modeling efficiency, evaluation quality, and consistency across teams.

The Impact Your work will influence how Dave makes critical financial decisions, measures success, and manages risk. By building reliable models and scalable governance practices, you'll help us expand access to useful financial products while supporting responsible, sustainable growth.

## What We're Looking For

- 8+ years of experience building production machine learning solutions, including demonstrated technical leadership at staff or principal scope.
- Strong experience with consumer credit modeling, portfolio economics, and risk-based decision systems, ideally in fintech or consumer lending.
- Experience with model validation, model risk management, or independent review in regulated environments, including familiarity with fair-lending and adverse-action considerations.
- Advanced proficiency in Python, SQL, statistical modeling, and machine learning frameworks such as PyTorch, XGBoost, or Spark.
- Experience designing experiments, defining business metrics, and measuring incremental impact through causal inference or holdout methodologies.
- Demonstrated ability to influence technical direction and communicate complex trade-offs across senior stakeholders.
- Practical experience using AI tools throughout the modeling lifecycle, with sound judgment in evaluating outputs.
- A bachelor's, master's, or doctoral degree in a quantitative field, or equivalent experience.

Bonus: Experience evaluating or governing generative AI applications, including model guardrails and monitoring.

What Makes Someone Successful Here You connect technical decisions to business outcomes and member experiences. You bring strong scientific judgment, challenge assumptions thoughtfully, and build solutions that remain reliable as the business evolves. You collaborate across disciplines, welcome constructive feedback, and help others strengthen their work. When priorities change or challenges aren't fully defined, you create clarity and move forward with sound reasoning and shared accountability.

What to Expect You'll have significant independence and influence across teams, supported by partners in Engineering, Product, Finance, Risk, and Compliance. Decisions are grounded in evidence, and you'll help shape the standards and processes that guide future work.

Why Join Dave? You'll tackle complex, meaningful challenges at the intersection of machine learning, financial access, and responsible innovation. You'll have the opportunity to shape company-wide technical practices while contributing directly to products that make a difference for millions of members.

Ready to build for the underdog?

Don’t let imposter syndrome get in the way of an incredible opportunity. We’re looking for people who can help us achieve our mission and vision, not just check off the boxes. If you’re excited about this role, we encourage you to apply. You may just be the right candidate for this or other roles.

Why you’ll love working here: At Dave, our people are just as important as our product. Our culture reflects the values that guide who we are, how we work, and what we aspire to be. Daves are member-centric, helpful, transparent, persistent, and better together. We strive to create an environment where all Daves feel valued, heard, and empowered to do their best work. As a virtual-first company, team members can live and work anywhere in the United States, except Hawaii.

A few of our benefits & perks: 💚 Opportunity to tackle tough challenges, learn and grow from fellow top talent, and help millions of people reach their personal financial goals 💻 Flexible hours and virtual-first work culture with a home office stipend 🏥 Premium Medical, Dental, and Vision Insurance plans 👶 Generous paid parental and caregiver leave 💰 401(k) savings plan with matching contributions 📈 Financial advisor and financial wellness support 🏖️ Flexible PTO and generous company holidays, including Juneteenth and Winter Break 🎉 All-company in-person events once or twice a year and virtual events throughout to connect with your team members and leadership team

Dave Operating LLC is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer and is dedicated to cultivating a diverse and inclusive workplace. We will consider for employment all qualified applicants and do not discriminate on any basis protected by federal, state, or local law, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance relating to an applicant's criminal history.

## #LI-REMOTE

## About Dave

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Dave is a US neobank building AI-powered financial products that provide short-term liquidity and cash flow management tools for everyday Americans.
- **Entity Type**: Public (Ticker: DAVE on Nasdaq)
- **Headquarters**: Los Angeles, California, USA
- **Founded**: 2017
- **Founders**: Jason Wilk

## Core Business
- **Primary industry/industries**: Consumer fintech, neobanking, short-term credit, AI-powered underwriting
- **Target customers**: 185 million Americans who regularly need help covering basic necessities between paychecks; primarily B2C with a focus on underbanked and credit-challenged consumers
- **Mission or purpose statement**: To level the financial playing field for Americans who need it most

## Products & Services
- **ExtraCash®**: Flagship product; cash advance of up to $500 between paychecks with no credit check, no late fees, and no compound interest. Clear pricing at $5 per $100 borrowed. Uses CashAI™ for underwriting.
- **CashAI™**: Proprietary AI underwriting model that analyzes cash flow (not credit scores) across 180+ data points including income, bank balance, spending patterns, and transaction history. Processes billions of data points to deliver high credit limits and low loss rates.
- **DaveGPT**: Generative AI assistant integrated into the app for real-time member support, handling account management, direct deposit setup, ExtraCash management, and general questions.
- **Pay In Four Card (forthcoming)**: A short-term credit product aimed at disrupting subprime credit cards with no credit check, late fees, or compound interest, expected to launch in future.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: ~$555.9 million market cap as of 2025
- **Key Metric**: Over 14 million members; CashAI has originated more than 180 million transactions; loss rates declined to nearly 1% while originations per user grew triple digits; customer acquisition cost under $20 (vs. incumbents spending hundreds)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Publicly traded; leadership team includes Jason Wilk (Co-Founder & CEO), Kyle Beilman (CFO & COO), Kevin Frisch (CMO), Joan Aristei (CLO)
- **Growth Signals**: 30% of new members join via word of mouth; triple-digit growth in originations per user; loss rates declining to near 1%; developing next-generation Pay In Four card; mission-driven growth narrative

## Competitive Advantages
- **CashAI moat**: Proprietary cash-flow underwriting engine that delivers better outcomes for short-duration liquidity than traditional FICO scoring, leading to higher credit limits and lower loss rates
- **Member-centric, transparent pricing**: Flat fee structure ($5 per $100) with no hidden terms, no compound interest, and no debt sent to collections
- **Low-cost customer acquisition**: Word-of-mouth referrals drive 30% of new members at a fraction of incumbent marketing costs (<$20 vs. hundreds of dollars)
- **Speed to value**: Members can be approved for up to $500 within minutes of joining, creating a strong conversion funnel

## Strategic Focus
- **Scale the flagship**: Continue growing ExtraCash membership and transaction volume, leveraging word-of-mouth flywheel and AI-driven underwriting
- **Build next-generation credit**: Develop the Pay In Four card as a new product line aimed at subprime credit card replacement
- **Deepen AI capabilities**: Continue refining CashAI and DaveGPT as core infrastructure for underwriting and member support
- **Operating efficiency**: Maintain low operating costs to pass savings to members and sustain competitive pricing

## Why Work Here
- **Fully remote-first**: Dave is a fully virtual company; team members can work from anywhere in the U.S. (except Hawaii for now); company brings the team together 1–2 times per year plus team offsites [dave.com](https://dave.com/careers)
- **Same competitive pay regardless of location**: Compensation is not differentiated by employee work location [dave.com](https://dave.com/careers)
- **Culture values**: Member-centric, helpful, transparent, persistent, "better together" [dave.com](https://dave.com/about)
- **Benefits**: 401(k) with company match, free financial advising, generous parental and caregiver leave, comprehensive health/dental/vision/disability/life insurance, flexible PTO, Juneteenth and winter break off [dave.com](https://dave.com/careers)
- **Open roles**: Active hiring in Software Engineering, Data Analytics, Machine Learning Platform Engineering, Product Management, Security & IT (9 current openings) [jobs.ashbyhq.com](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/dave)
- **Mission-driven**: Focus on building products that level the financial playing field for everyday Americans [dave.com](https://dave.com/about)

## Sources
1. [dave.com - About Page](https://dave.com/about)
2. [dave.com - Careers Page](https://dave.com/careers)
3. [investors.dave.com - Our Story](https://investors.dave.com/our-story)
4. [jobs.ashbyhq.com - Dave Jobs](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/dave)
5. [linkedin.com - Dave Jobs](https://www.linkedin.com/company/dave-com/jobs)

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