Senior Machine Learning Engineer
Company: Ohalo
Location: South San Francisco
Posted on: February 18, 2026
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Job Description:
Job Description Job Description Position Title: Senior Machine
Engineer / Lead Location: San Francisco, CA Time Type: Full Time
The Opportunity Ohalo is looking for a hands-on Senior Machine
Learning Engineer / Lead to convert cutting-edge
quantitative-genetics and computer vision research into production
systems that accelerate crop improvement. You will steer a squad of
ML/Data/Software Engineers, partnering with quantitative
geneticists and statisticians to deliver Bayesian
genomic-prediction pipelines, breeding-system simulations, and
AI-powered hybrid-optimization services. Your work will directly
shape how breeders make thousands of crossing decisions and drive
the next leap in agricultural productivity. Responsibilities
Design, build, and maintain scalable ML pipelines on GCP (or the
best-fit cloud) using Python, BigQuery/Spark, Kubernetes, and CI/CD
best practices. Mentor & grow a small team —provide technical
guidance, establish code-review norms, and cultivate a culture of
rapid, well-engineered experimentation. Own model-ops lifecycle :
automated testing, containerized deployment, continuous monitoring,
and A/B evaluation against breeding KPIs. Collaborate
cross-functionally with plant scientists, data engineers, and the
automation group to ingest high-throughput phenotyping data and
close feedback loops. Establish MLOps Excellence: Build robust
infrastructure for model versioning, data lineage, and automated
retraining ; implement "champion-challenger" deployment patterns to
safely promote research models to production while ensuring full
auditability of breeding decisions. Required Qualifications:
Education – M.S. in Computer Science or related field (or
equivalent industry record). Experience – 5 years building
production ML/AI systems, technical lead experience preferred
Engineering excellence – Expert Python plus one ML framework
(JAX/NumPyro, TensorFlow, or PyTorch); strong grasp of
microservices, Docker/Kubernetes, and cloud data platforms
(BigQuery, Vertex AI, etc.). Data-engineering acumen – Comfortable
designing batch, streaming, and event-driven pipelines; Pub/Sub,
Kafka, or equivalent. Leadership & communication – Able to set
direction, give candid feedback, and bridge domain-scientist ?
engineer conversations with clarity. Nice to have: Advanced Image
Techniques – Proficiency in leveraging Foundation Models (e.g.,
SAM, CLIP) and Self-Supervised Learning to automate high-throughput
feature extraction, converting unstructured imagery into
high-dimensional embeddings for advanced statistical analysis.
About Ohalo: Ohalo™ aims to accelerate evolution to unlock nature's
potential. Founded in 2019, Ohalo develops novel breeding systems
and improved plant varieties that help farmers grow more food with
fewer natural resources, increasing the yield, resiliency, and
genetic diversity of crops to sustainably feed our population.
Ohalo's breakthrough technology, Boosted Breeding™, will usher in a
new era of improved productivity to radically transform global
agriculture. For more information, visit www.ohalo.com. The
anticipated pay range for this role is $170,000 - $220,000 per year
for our San Francisco, CA location, though salary will be based on
a variety of factors including, but not limited to, experience,
skills, education, and location. Notes: If you previously applied
for a job at Ohalo Genetics, we encourage you to restate your
interest in the position by submitting your application. No visa
sponsorship is available for this position at this time. No
recruiters, please.
Keywords: Ohalo, North Highlands , Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Science, Research & Development , South San Francisco, California
