Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Fraud Risk Modeling

$115K - $230K Palo Alto, CA, US Senior AI/ML Engineer

Interested in this AI/ML Engineer role at GEICO?

Apply Now →

Skills & Technologies

AwsAzureDockerGcpKubernetesPythonPytorchTensorflow

About This Role

AI job market dashboard showing open roles by category

Why Join GEICO?

At GEICO, we offer a rewarding career where your ambitions are met with endless possibilities.

Every day we honor our iconic brand by offering quality coverage to millions of customers and being there when they need us most. We thrive on relentless innovation to exceed our customers' expectations while making a real impact on local communities nationwide.

Founded in 1936, GEICO is a member of the Berkshire Hathaway family of companies and one of the largest auto insurers in the United States. When you join our company, we want you to feel valued, supported, and proud to work here. That's why we offer the GEICO Pledge: Great Company, Great Culture, Great Rewards, and Great Careers.

GEICO is seeking an experienced Senior Machine Learning Engineer to join the AI organization. This person will take on a critical leadership role in designing, implementing, and deploying cutting-edge machine learning models that solve real-world business challenges. You will collaborate with various business units to build scalable, high-performance ML systems with a strong emphasis on system design. In addition to technical contributions, you will mentor junior engineers, drive the full lifecycle of machine learning model development, and ensure that models are seamlessly integrated into production. This position requires expertise in both machine learning and software engineering to develop robust, production-grade solutions.

Key Responsibilities:

  • Lead the Design & Implementation of ML Models: Lead the architecture and implementation of machine learning models, working closely with Product, Business Units, and Engineering teams.
  • Build Scalable Infrastructure: Design and develop scalable infrastructure for model training, automated hyperparameter tuning, and deployment pipelines, ensuring that systems are reliable and performant at scale.
  • Write Production-Grade Code for ML Services and APIs: Write high-quality, maintainable production-grade code that turns machine learning models into deployable services and APIs. Ensure that code is modular and reusable for future ML projects.
  • Optimize Model Performance and Resolve Issues: Debug and troubleshoot model performance issues, track key metrics, and continuously enhance model reliability, speed, and efficiency in production environments.
  • End-to-End Model Lifecycle Management: Own the complete lifecycle of ML models, including monitoring, retraining, and managing versions of models to ensure they continue to meet business needs over time.
  • Leadership and Mentorship: Guide and mentor junior machine learning engineers, promote best practices in software engineering, model development, and deployment. Lead technical decision-making processes and foster collaboration within the team.
  • Collaboration Across Teams: Collaborate with cross-functional teams (e.g., data engineering, software development, and product management) to integrate machine learning models and ensure smooth deployment and operations in production systems.
  • Stay Up to Date with Industry Trends: Continuously explore and integrate new machine learning techniques and system engineering tools, ensuring the team remains at the forefront of machine learning and systems architecture practices.

Basic Qualifications:

  • B.Sc. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Engineering, or a related technical field.
  • 6+ years of hands-on experience applying machine learning techniques, including deep learning, reinforcement learning, and NLP in production environments.
  • 6+ years of experience utilizing open-source/cloud-agnostic components such as data warehouse (e.g. snowflake), streaming platform (e.g. Kafka), relational database (e.g. PostgreSQL), NoSQL (e.g. MongoDB, Cassandra), distributed processing (e.g. Spark, Ray), workflow management (e.g. Airflow, Temporal), etc.
  • 6+ years of professional software development experience with at least two general-purpose programming languages such as Java, C++, Python or C#.
  • 6+ years of experience with machine learning frameworks such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-learn for model development.
  • At least 4 years of experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and containerization technologies such as Docker, as well as orchestration tools like Kubernetes.
  • Proven experience in deploying machine learning models in a production environment, ensuring scalability, reliability, and high availability.

Core Engineering Skills & Knowledge:

  • Extensive experience with object-oriented design (OOD), design patterns, writing clean, and maintainable code. Proficiency in version control (Git) and familiarity with Agile methodologies.
  • Solid understanding of distributed systems and the challenges associated with scaling machine learning models in production, such as managing distributed data processing and microservices architectures.
  • Expertise in implementing MLOPs practices, including setting up continuous integration (CI), continuous delivery (CD), automated testing, and deployment pipelines for ML models.
  • Strong understanding of system architecture, performance optimization, designing fault-tolerant systems that handle large-scale data and high-volume requests.
  • Experience designing and deploying machine learning models using cloud-based environments like AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud. Familiarity with cloud-native tools such as AWS Sage Maker, GCP AI Platform, or Azure Machine Learning.
  • Experience setting up monitoring and logging systems to track performance in production environments and ensuring efficient resource utilization.

Preferred Qualifications:

  • Experience with designing and building high-performance distributed systems that handle large-scale data ingestion and processing for machine learning workloads.
  • Experience with real-time inference pipelines and low-latency model serving.
  • Familiar with serverless computing or managed services for ML model deployment.
  • Advanced degree (M.Sc., Ph.D.) in a related field is a plus.
  • Experience in working with GPU/TPU optimization for accelerated model training and inference.

Annual Salary

$115,000.00 - $230,000.00 The above annual salary range is a general guideline. Multiple factors are taken into consideration to arrive at the final hourly rate/ annual salary to be offered to the selected candidate. Factors include, but are not limited to, the scope and responsibilities of the role, the selected candidate’s work experience, education and training, the work location as well as market and business considerations.

GEICO will consider sponsoring a new qualified applicant for employment authorization for this position. The GEICO Pledge:

Great Company: Protecting customers through life’s twists and turns with innovation and integrity.

Great Careers:Personalized development programs, mentorship, and certification assistance.

Great Culture:Inclusive and collaborative culture rooted in shared success.

Great Rewards:Competitive pay, benefits, and flexibility to support your well-being and future.

The equal employment opportunity policy of the GEICO Companies provides for a fair and equal employment opportunity for all associates and job applicants regardless of race, color, religious creed, national origin, ancestry, age, gender, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, familial status, disability or genetic information, in compliance with applicable federal, state and local law. GEICO hires and promotes individuals solely on the basis of their qualifications for the job to be filled.

GEICO reasonably accommodates qualified individuals with disabilities to enable them to receive equal employment opportunity and/or perform the essential functions of the job, unless the accommodation would impose an undue hardship to the Company. This applies to all applicants and associates. GEICO also provides a work environment in which each associate is able to be productive and work to the best of their ability. We do not condone or tolerate an atmosphere of intimidation or harassment. We expect and require the cooperation of all associates in maintaining an atmosphere free from discrimination and harassment with mutual respect by and for all associates and applicants.

Salary Context

This $115K-$230K range is below the median for AI/ML Engineer roles in our dataset (median: $176K across 1540 roles with salary data).

View full AI/ML Engineer salary data →

Role Details

Company GEICO
Title Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Fraud Risk Modeling
Location Palo Alto, CA, US
Category AI/ML Engineer
Experience Senior
Salary $115K - $230K
Remote No

About This Role

AI/ML Engineers build and deploy machine learning models in production. They work across the full ML lifecycle: data pipelines, model training, evaluation, and serving infrastructure. The role has evolved significantly over the past two years. Where ML Engineers once spent most of their time on model architecture, the job now tilts heavily toward inference optimization, cost management, and integrating LLM capabilities into existing systems. Companies want engineers who can ship production systems, and the experimenter-only role is fading fast.

Day-to-day, you're writing training pipelines, debugging data quality issues, setting up evaluation frameworks, and figuring out why your model performs differently in staging than it did on your dev set. The best ML engineers are obsessive about reproducibility and measurement. They instrument everything. They know that a model is only as good as the data feeding it and the infrastructure serving it.

Across the 9,653 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 76% of the market. At GEICO, this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

What the Work Looks Like

A typical week might include: debugging a data pipeline that's silently dropping 3% of training examples, running A/B tests on a new model version, writing documentation for a feature flag system that lets you roll back model deployments, and reviewing a junior engineer's PR for a new evaluation metric. Meetings tend to be cross-functional since ML touches product, engineering, and data teams.

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

Skills Required

Aws (9% of roles) Azure (8% of roles) Docker (3% of roles) Gcp (5% of roles) Kubernetes (4% of roles) Python (17% of roles) Pytorch (5% of roles) Tensorflow (4% of roles)

Python and PyTorch dominate the requirements. Most roles expect experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with ML frameworks like TensorFlow or JAX. RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) has become a top-3 skill requirement as companies integrate LLMs into their products. Docker and Kubernetes show up in about a third of postings, reflecting the production focus of the role.

Beyond the core stack, employers increasingly want experience with experiment tracking tools (MLflow, Weights & Biases), feature stores, and vector databases. Fine-tuning experience is valuable but less common than you'd think from reading Twitter. Most production LLM work is RAG and prompt engineering, not fine-tuning. If you have both, you're in a strong position.

Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.

Compensation Benchmarks

AI/ML Engineer roles pay a median of $212,000 based on 11,857 positions with disclosed compensation. Senior-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $228,700. This role's midpoint ($172K) sits 19% below the category median. Disclosed range: $115K to $230K.

Across all AI roles, the market median is $213,400. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,230. The 90th percentile reaches $319,400. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($253,100) and Research Engineer ($252,000). By seniority level: Entry: $110,408; Mid: $193,200; Senior: $228,700; Director: $272,275; VP: $235,000.

GEICO AI Hiring

GEICO has 19 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer, AI Agent Developer, AI Software Engineer, AI Product Manager. Positions span Palo Alto, CA, US, Seattle, WA, US, New York, NY, US. Compensation range: $230K - $300K.

Location Context

Across all AI roles, 6% (568 positions) offer remote work, while 9,010 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (2,878 roles, $221,000 median); San Francisco (2,413 roles, $264,500 median); Los Angeles (1,340 roles, $210,000 median).

Career Path

Common paths into AI/ML Engineer roles include Data Scientist, Software Engineer, Research Engineer.

From here, career progression typically leads toward ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer.

The fastest path into ML engineering is through software engineering with a self-directed ML education. A CS degree helps, but production engineering skills matter more than academic credentials. Build something that works, deploy it, and measure it. That portfolio project is worth more than a Coursera certificate. For career growth, the fork comes around the senior level: go deep on technical complexity (staff/principal track) or move into managing ML teams.

What to Expect in Interviews

Expect system design questions around ML pipelines: how you'd build a training pipeline for a specific use case, handle data drift, or design A/B testing infrastructure for model deployments. Coding rounds typically involve Python, with emphasis on data manipulation (pandas, numpy) and algorithm implementation. Take-home assignments often ask you to build an end-to-end ML pipeline from raw data to deployed model.

When evaluating opportunities: Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.

AI Hiring Overview

The AI job market has 9,653 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 193 entry-level, 4,500 mid-level, 3,455 senior, and 1,505 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 6% of the market (568 positions). The remaining 9,010 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.

The market median for AI roles is $213,400. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,230. The 90th percentile reaches $319,400. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($253,100 median, 57 roles); Research Engineer ($252,000 median, 419 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($251,622 median, 51 roles).

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

The AI Job Market Today

The AI job market spans 9,653 open positions across 16 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (7,301), Data Scientist (441), AI Software Engineer (438). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.

The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (193) are outnumbered by mid-level (4,500) and senior (3,455) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 1,505 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.

Remote work availability sits at 6% of all AI roles (568 positions), with 9,010 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.

AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $213,400. Top-quartile roles start at $264,230, and the 90th percentile reaches $319,400. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.

Category matters for compensation. AI Safety roles lead at $253,100 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $141,440. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.

The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (1,605 postings), Aws (916 postings), Azure (724 postings), Rag (634 postings), Gcp (522 postings), Pytorch (495 postings), Kubernetes (384 postings), Claude (383 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.

Frequently Asked Questions

Based on 11,857 roles with disclosed compensation, the median salary for AI/ML Engineer positions is $212,000. Actual compensation varies by seniority, location, and company stage.
Python and PyTorch dominate the requirements. Most roles expect experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with ML frameworks like TensorFlow or JAX. RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) has become a top-3 skill requirement as companies integrate LLMs into their products. Docker and Kubernetes show up in about a third of postings, reflecting the production focus of the role.
About 6% of the 9,653 AI roles we track offer remote work. Remote availability varies by company and seniority level, with senior and leadership roles more likely to offer location flexibility.
GEICO is among the companies actively hiring for AI and ML talent. Check our company profiles for detailed breakdowns of open roles, salary ranges, and hiring trends.
Common next steps from AI/ML Engineer positions include ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer. Progression depends on whether you lean toward technical depth, people management, or product strategy.

Get Weekly AI Career Intelligence

Salary data, skills demand, and market signals from 16,000+ AI job postings. Every Monday.