MLOps Engineer

About XPS Group: XPS Group is a prominent and growing UK consultancy and administration firm within the pensions and insurance sectors. As a FTSE 250 company with over 2000 employees, we leverage expertise alongside advanced technology to serve over 1,400 pension schemes and their sponsors. Our goal is to foster a workplace where diverse talents thrive.

Location: London

Employment Type: Permanent, Full Time

Grade: Senior Associate / Consultant

Working Arrangement: Hybrid

Reference: REQ003340

About The Role: Our Data Analytics business continues to grow, and we are now looking for an experienced and technical MLOps Engineer to join our vibrant London office with hybrid working. This is an exciting role and would most likely suit someone with previous experience in a similar role where they have gained knowledge and experience of designing, building, optimising, deploying and managing business‑critical machine learning models using Azure ML in Production environments. You must have good technical knowledge of Python, SQL, CI/CD and be familiar with Power BI.

XPS Analytics is a specialist and multi‑disciplinary team consisting of actuaries, data scientists and developers. Our role in this mission is to pioneer advancements in the field of pensions and beyond, leveraging state‑of‑the‑art technology to extract valuable and timely insights from data. This enables the consultant to better advise Trustees and Corporate clients on a wide range of actuarial‑related areas.

Key Responsibilities:

• Model development: Work collaboratively with actuarial analysts to develop machine learning and statistical models to predict outcomes related to pension schemes, such as life expectancy, default risk, or investment returns. Identify appropriate machine learning algorithms and apply them to enhance predictions, automate decision‑making processes, and improve client offerings.
• Machine Learning Operations: Responsible for designing, deploying, maintaining and refining statistical and machine learning models using Azure ML. Optimize model performance and computational efficiency. Ensure that applications run smoothly and handle large‑scale data efficiently. Implement and maintain monitoring of model drifts, data‑quality alerts, scheduled re‑training pipelines.
• Data Management and Preprocessing: Collect, clean and preprocess large datasets to facilitate analysis and model training. Implement data pipelines and ETL processes to ensure data availability and quality.
• Software Development: Write clean, efficient and scalable code in Python. Utilize CI/CD practices for version control, testing and code review. Work closely with actuarial analysts, actuarial modelling team (AMT) and other colleagues in XPS to integrate data science findings into practical advice and strategies. Stay abreast of new trends and technologies in Data Science and pensions to identify opportunities for innovation. Provide training and support to other team members on using machine learning tools and understanding analytical techniques. Interpret and explain machine learning concepts and findings to other members of the analytics team and non‑technical stakeholders within XPS.

Essential Your Profile:

• Previous experience in designing, building, optimising, deploying and managing business‑critical machine learning models using Azure ML in Production environments.
• Experience in data wrangling using Python, SQL and Azure Data Factory.
• Experience in CI/CD and DevOps/MLOps and version control.
• Familiarity with data visualization and reporting tools, ideally Power BI.
• Good written and verbal communication and interpersonal skills.
• Ability to convey technical concepts to non‑technical stakeholders.
• Experience in the pensions or similar regulated financial services industry is highly desirable.
• Experience in working within a multidisciplinary team would be beneficial.

What We Offer:

• Enjoy a competitive salary, annual discretionary bonus and 25 days’ holiday with buy/sell flexibility.
• Benefits include pension matching, healthcare plans, life assurance and retailer discounts.
• We support our team with a flexible benefits scheme, employee assistance, and digital GP service.
• Participating in volunteering events is encouraged with paid volunteer days available.
• Referral bonuses are offered for introducing suitable candidates to XPS.

Equal Opportunities Statement: XPS Group is committed to diversity and equal opportunities. We welcome applications from all candidates, irrespective of sex, race, disability, sexual orientation, religion or belief. As a Disability Confident employer, we ensure accessible and supportive work settings for all employees.

Eligibility: Any employment offer made will be conditional upon you satisfying DBS Disclosure checks, Employment or educational references, satisfactory credit checks and eligibility to work in the UK before an offer can be made. XPS Group is not able to provide sponsorship to employees.