Microsoft

Principal Applied Scientist

Microsoft
onsite senior full-time $139,900 - $274,800 per year Mountain View
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First indexed 6 Mar 2026

Description

Summary

Microsoft are looking for a talented Principal Applied Scientist at their Mountain View office. This role sits at the heart of advancing large-scale ranking models that power Microsoft Advertising, generating billions of impressions and revenue-critical decisions daily. You will combine deep machine learning expertise, solid engineering execution, and business intuition to modernize our prediction stack, drive model innovation, and mentor a growing team of scientists and engineers.

About the Role

We are seeking a Principal Applied Scientist to lead the next generation of click-through-rate (CTR) for Microsoft Advertising. This is a high-impact role responsible for advancing large-scale ranking models that power Microsoft Advertising, generating billions of impressions and revenue-critical decisions daily. You will combine deep machine learning expertise, solid engineering execution, and business intuition to modernize our prediction stack, drive model innovation, and mentor a growing team of scientists and engineers. This role is ideal for someone who thrives in complex, high-scale systems, who brings thought leadership to ML strategy, and who raises the bar for engineering rigor, curiosity, and business-driven decision making across the team.

Accountabilities

  • Lead the end-to-end development of large-scale CTR and other user response signal models for Search and Display ads.
  • Design, prototype, and ship cutting-edge ML architectures (deep models, multi-task, transformer-based, LLM-assisted, multimodal).

The Candidate we're looking for

Experience:

  • Bachelor’s Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 6+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research) OR Master’s Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 4+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research) OR Doctorate in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 3+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research) OR equivalent experience.

Technical skills:

  • 5+ years experience creating publications (e.g., patents, libraries, peer-reviewed academic papers).
  • 2+ years experience presenting at conferences or other events in the outside research/industry community as an invited speaker.
  • 5+ years experience conducting research as part of a research program (in academic or industry settings).

Personal attributes:

  • 3+ years experience developing and deploying live production systems, as part of a product team.
  • 3+ years experience developing and deploying products or systems at multiple points in the product cycle from ideation to shipping.

Benefits

  • Competitive salary.
  • Comprehensive benefits package.
  • Opportunities for professional growth and development.
  • Collaborative and dynamic work environment.
This listing is enriched and indexed by YubHub. To apply, use the employer's original posting: https://microsoft.ai/job/principal-applied-scientist-11/