Ontology Engineer - Graph & Knowledge Modeling Pro

Sambatv; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Samba TV is seeking an Ontology Engineer to build and maintain knowledge graph schemas, derivation pipelines, and graph data models for our measurement products in San Francisco. You will implement ontologies, validate with SHACL, and contribute to entity resolution under mentorship from the Senior Ontologist.

You’ll write production Python and SPARQL, collaborate with data engineers, and grow expertise in W3C standards, RDF stores, and graph-powered analytics in a fast-paced team.

Qualifications

• 2–4 years of hands-on experience in knowledge graph development, semantic data modeling, ontology engineering, or a closely related field.
• Working knowledge of W3C semantic web standards: RDF, RDFS, OWL, and SPARQL - with practical experience querying or building in at least one triplestore or graph database.
• Familiarity with SHACL or equivalent constraint and validation frameworks for graph data quality.
• Strong Python skills - clean, readable, production-quality code with testing and documentation.
• Solid understanding of data modeling fundamentals - entity-relationship design, taxonomies, hierarchies, and how to represent complex real-world relationships in structured form.
• Familiarity with entity resolution or data matching concepts - understanding of why the same real-world entity appears under different identifiers across data sources.
• Bachelor's degree required in Computer Science, Information Science, Mathematics, or a related field; Master's preferred
• Detail-oriented and proactive about flagging data quality issues and schema inconsistencies

Responsibilities

• Implement and extend Samba's RDF/RDFS/OWL ontology schemas in the graph database - adding entity classes, properties, and constraints in a consistent, governed way under the direction of the Senior Ontologist
• Build and maintain SHACL validation shapes for post-load graph consistency checks; identify and triage data quality and schema violations
• Support ontology versioning, change log documentation, and consistency checking across schema updates
• Write efficient, well-structured SPARQL queries and graph traversals to support downstream data science and product use cases
• Contribute to event-to-ontology transformation and derivation layer - building PySpark/Databricks pipelines that aggregate raw TV viewership and web activity events into durable graph attributes
• Implement derivation logic specified by the Senior Ontologist and data science team; validate outputs against SHACL shapes before graph load
• Support incremental refresh and update logic aligned with the graph's batch refresh cadence
• Write production-quality Python - clean, tested, documented, and reusable by teammates
• Work with PySpark and Databricks to process and transform high-volume data as part of graph pipeline development
• Apply embedding-based approaches (semantic similarity, vector search) to entity matching and ontology alignment tasks
• Contribute to team tooling, documentation, and reusable components that improve knowledge graph development efficiency
• Partner closely with data engineering on pipeline design, data quality, and incremental ingestion patterns feeding the materialized graph substrate
• Participate in ontology design reviews and cross-functional working groups
• Work with product and operations teams to understand use case requirements and translate them into graph schema updates
• Actively develop expertise in W3C semantic web standards, RDF-native graph databases, and entity resolution under the guidance of the Senior Ontologist

Skills

Knowledge graph development

Semantic data modeling

Ontology engineering

Python

SPARQL

PySpark

Databricks

Entity resolution

W3C standards

Graph databases

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Master's degree preferred

Tools

Amazon Neptune

Stardog

Databricks

RDF stores

Job description

Samba TV is seeking an Ontology Engineer to build and maintain knowledge graph schemas, derivation pipelines, and graph data models for our measurement products in San Francisco. You will implement ontologies, validate with SHACL, and contribute to entity resolution under mentorship from the Senior Ontologist.

You’ll write production Python and SPARQL, collaborate with data engineers, and grow expertise in W3C standards, RDF stores, and graph-powered analytics in a fast-paced team.