Senior Data Engineer - Semantics & Domain Models

Chain IQ Group; Lisboa; On-site; EUR 70,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

Chain IQ Lisbon is seeking a semantic modeling expert to define ontologies, knowledge graphs, and context graphs that underpin an AI-native procurement platform.

You will model entities, relationships, events, and lifecycle states, collaborate with Data Architecture, Data Engineering, Product, AI, Domain, and Governance teams, and shape the semantic backbone used by retrieval, reasoning, and automation.

Qualifications

• Experience with semantic modelling, ontology design, knowledge graphs, or domain modelling.
• Ability to translate complex procurement concepts into reusable semantic structures.
• Strong understanding of entities, relationships, lifecycle states, and business context.
• Comfort collaborating with data engineers, architects, product teams, domain experts, and AI engineers.

Responsibilities

• Define and maintain procurement ontologies covering entities, attributes, relationships, events, states, and business concepts.
• Own the semantic model for core domains such as suppliers, contracts, obligations, sourcing events, categories, risks, savings, and operational workflows.
• Design and evolve procurement knowledge graphs representing entities, relationships, dependencies, events, and business context.
• Define context graph patterns used to assemble relevant information for users, workflows, retrieval systems, and AI agents.
• Model temporal relationships, lifecycle states, provenance, hierarchy, ownership, and dependency structures explicitly.
• Define graph construction patterns linking structured data, documents, communications, workflow events, and external signals to canonical entities.
• Establish approaches for entity resolution, supplier normalization, deduplication, identity management, and relationship confidence.
• Define validation rules and quality expectations for ontology and graph structures.
• Ensure semantic and graph models support retrieval, reasoning, recommendations, workflow automation, and agentic execution.
• Collaborate with Data Architecture, Data Engineering, Product, AI, Domain, and Governance teams to ensure graph structures are technically feasible, governed, and useful.
• Help eliminate duplicated business logic from dashboards, applications, and workflow tools by moving meaning into shared semantic and graph assets.

Skills

Semantic modelling

Ontology design

Knowledge graphs

Graph data modelling

Domain modelling

Entity resolution

Provenance & metadata management

Tools

Graph databases

RDF/Property graphs

Job description

At Chain IQ, your ideas move fast.

Chain IQ is a global AI-driven Procurement Service Partner, headquartered in Baar, Switzerland, with operations across main centers and 16 offices worldwide. We provide tailored, end-to-end procurement solutions that enable transformation, drive scalability, and deliver substantial reductions in our clients' indirect spend. Our culture is built on innovation, entrepreneurship, ownership, and impact. Here, your voice matters - bold thinking is encouraged, and action follows ambition.

Role purpose

We are building the semantic and graph foundation for an AI-native procurement platform. This role defines and evolves the ontologies, knowledge graphs, and context graphs that allow applications, analytics, workflows, and AI agents to understand procurement data consistently.

You will model the business meaning, entities, relationships, events, and context that sit beneath the platform’s intelligence layer. This is not dashboard semantics. This is the semantic backbone for retrieval, reasoning, agent orchestration, workflow automation, and decision support.

Responsibilities

• Define and maintain procurement ontologies covering entities, attributes, relationships, events, states, and business concepts.
• Own the semantic model for core domains such as suppliers, contracts, obligations, sourcing events, categories, risks, savings, and operational workflows.
• Design and evolve procurement knowledge graphs representing entities, relationships, dependencies, events, and business context.
• Define context graph patterns used to assemble relevant information for users, workflows, retrieval systems, and AI agents.
• Model temporal relationships, lifecycle states, provenance, hierarchy, ownership, and dependency structures explicitly.
• Define graph construction patterns linking structured data, documents, communications, workflow events, and external signals to canonical entities.
• Establish approaches for entity resolution, supplier normalization, deduplication, identity management, and relationship confidence.
• Define validation rules and quality expectations for ontology and graph structures.
• Ensure semantic and graph models support retrieval, reasoning, recommendations, workflow automation, and agentic execution.
• Collaborate with Data Architecture, Data Engineering, Product, AI, Domain, and Governance teams to ensure graph structures are technically feasible, governed, and useful.
• Help eliminate duplicated business logic from dashboards, applications, and workflow tools by moving meaning into shared semantic and graph assets.

Requirements

• Experience with semantic modelling, ontology design, knowledge graphs, graph data modelling, or domain modelling.
• Strong understanding of entities, relationships, events, lifecycle states, and business context.
• Ability to translate complex procurement concepts into reusable semantic and graph structures.
• Familiarity with graph databases, RDF/property graph concepts, ontologies, taxonomies, or knowledge representation.
• Understanding of entity resolution, normalization, provenance, lineage, and metadata management.
• Ability to design models that support both human interpretation and machine reasoning.
• Comfort collaborating with data engineers, architects, product teams, domain experts, and AI engineers.
• Strong attention to consistency, correctness, and long-term semantic maintainability.

Join a truly global team.

We offer a dynamic and international environment where high performance meets real purpose. We're proud to be Great Place to Work-certified and even prouder of the people who make that possible. Let’s shape the future of procurement - together.

Chain IQ – Create. Lead. Make an impact.