Lead Applied Scientist: Generative & Agentic AI (Insurance)

i3; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

i3, a London-based insurer, seeks a Lead Applied Scientist to own AI/ML, Generative AI and agentic AI initiatives. The role is hands-on, developing production-grade Python solutions while guiding scientific strategy and quality for AI systems in insurance data contexts.

Based in London with a hybrid model (3 days in the office), you will design, evaluate and deploy advanced AI solutions, mentor junior staff, and lead responsible AI practices across bias, fairness and risk.

Qualifications

• Hands-on experience with LLMs and Generative AI, including RAG, prompt engineering and fine-tuning.
• Excellent Python skills and foundations in statistics, probability, ML, experimental design and model validation.
• Experience building evaluation frameworks for AI systems, measuring quality and reliability of LLM/RAG/agent outputs.
• Production experience: taking AI solutions from experimentation to production; Databricks, MLflow, Spark experience.
• Insurance or reinsurance experience preferred; understanding underwriting, claims data or related insurance data.
• Postgraduate qualification in CS, Statistics, Mathematics or quantitative discipline advantageous.

Responsibilities

• Lead the scientific design and development of AI/ML, Generative AI and agentic AI solutions.
• Design LLM applications with RAG, tool use, prompting and multi-step agent workflows.
• Own evaluation methodologies for LLMs, RAG and agentic systems, including metrics and acceptance thresholds.
• Apply rigorous statistics to experimentation, uncertainty, model behavior and validation.
• Tackle complex problems with unstructured documents, automation, forecasting and portfolio analysis.
• Set standards for experimentation, evaluation, coding and documentation.
• Lead Responsible AI practices covering bias, fairness, explainability and model risk.
• Write production‑quality Python and review work of other scientists and engineers.
• Work with Databricks, MLflow and Spark alongside modern LLM/AI frameworks.
• Mentor Data Scientists and Engineers through technical reviews and guidance.

Skills

LLMs & Generative AI

Python proficiency

Statistics & experimental design

Education

Postgraduate qualification in Computer Science/Statistics/Mathematics

Tools

Databricks

MLflow

Spark

Job description

i3, a London-based insurer, seeks a Lead Applied Scientist to own AI/ML, Generative AI and agentic AI initiatives. The role is hands-on, developing production-grade Python solutions while guiding scientific strategy and quality for AI systems in insurance data contexts.

Based in London with a hybrid model (3 days in the office), you will design, evaluate and deploy advanced AI solutions, mentor junior staff, and lead responsible AI practices across bias, fairness and risk.