Research Platform Lead

UBS; New York (NY); On-site; USD 234,000 - 251,000; Full time

Job summary

UBS in New York is seeking a Director, Research Platform Lead to guide the Quantitative Research Platform's ongoing development and evolution. The role demands deep software architecture expertise, leadership in engineering practices, and long-term ownership of platform capabilities and research products.

You will work with the embedded Quantitative Research Platform team to advance architecture, principles, and production-quality software systems, ensuring scalable, maintainable, and robust

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or advanced degree in Computer Science.
• Ideally 5+ years of recent hands-on Python development experience.
• Ownership of production-quality Python codebases.
• Strong foundation in data structures, algorithms, and design patterns.
• Experience designing scalable, maintainable software systems.
• Ability to translate research requirements into robust software.

Responsibilities

• Lead ongoing development and evolution of the Quantitative Research Platform.
• Define architectural standards, software engineering practices, and development principles.
• Partner with researchers and platform teams to deliver scalable capabilities.
• Improve reliability, maintainability, transparency, reproducibility, and governance.
• Take ownership of research products and models to ensure production readiness.

Skills

Python development

Production codebases

Data structures

Algorithms

Object-Oriented Design

Software Architecture

Software Testing

Version Control Systems

Research-to-Production translation

Education

Bachelor's degree or advanced degree in Computer Science

Job description

• Lead the ongoing development and evolution of the Quantitative Research Platform.
• Define architectural standards, software engineering practices, and development principles.
• Partner closely with researchers and the embedded Research Platform team to deliver scalable platform capabilities.
• Improve platform reliability, maintainability, transparency, reproducibility, and governance.
• Contribute to the strategic principles driving the long‑term evolution of the research platform.

Full Time

338559BR

New York

Key Responsibilities

Platform Development

• Lead the ongoing development and evolution of the Quantitative Research Platform.
• Define architectural standards, software engineering practices, and development principles.
• Partner closely with researchers and the embedded Research Platform team to deliver scalable platform capabilities.
• Improve platform reliability, maintainability, transparency, reproducibility, and governance.
• Contribute to the strategic principles driving the long‑term evolution of the research platform.

Software Architecture & Engineering

• Design and implement scalable software frameworks supporting research and production workflows.
• Apply software engineering best practices including object‑oriented design, design patterns, testing frameworks, code reviews, and version control.
• Design clean, reusable, maintainable, and extensible software systems.
• Review and approve critical architecture decisions and production code.
• Mentor developers and promote engineering excellence across the Quantitative Research organization.

Research Product Ownership

• Take ownership of selected existing research products and quantitative models within Global Quantitative Research.
• Develop sufficient understanding of inherited research models to maintain, enhance, and support them over time.
• Collaborate closely with researchers to evolve existing models and analytical frameworks.
• Ensure research products remain scalable, maintainable, and production‑ready.
• Support the migration of research into production environments through robust engineering and platform design.

The team

Global Quantitative Research is seeking a Director, Research Platform Lead to help drive the next phase of our research platform evolution. This role is intended for an experienced software architect and platform developer with a strong computer science foundation and demonstrated experience building scalable, maintainable, and production‑quality software systems. The successful candidate will work closely with the embedded Quantitative Research Platform team to advance the architecture, design principles, and engineering standards that underpin the research platform. In addition to platform development, the candidate will take ownership of selected existing research products and models within Global Quantitative Research, ensuring their ongoing maintenance, enhancement, scalability, and production readiness. The ideal candidate is a strong computer scientist who can understand complex analytical systems, contribute to platform evolution, and help translate research concepts into robust software solutions. This is a director position focused on building software foundations that enable research at scale while supporting the continued evolution of quantitative research products.

Required Qualifications

Your skills and experience

• Bachelor's degree or advanced degree in Computer Science.
• ideally 5+ years of recent hands‑on Python development experience.
• Demonstrated ownership of production‑quality Python codebases.
• Strong foundation in:
• Data Structures
• Algorithms
• Complexity Analysis
• Object‑Oriented Design
• Design Patterns
• Software Architecture
• Software Testing
• Version Control Systems
• Proven ability to design scalable, maintainable, reusable, and extensible software systems.
• Demonstrated experience building and supporting production software applications.
• Strong software engineering discipline and coding standards.
• Experience performing code reviews and maintaining engineering quality standards.
• Ability to understand complex analytical systems and quantitative models.
• Experience translating business or research requirements into robust software solutions.
• Ability to work effectively with researchers, developers, and platform teams.
• Willingness and capability to take long‑term ownership of both platform capabilities and research products.

Desirable Experience

• Quantitative finance or quantitative research environnements.
• Graph theory and graph‑oriented software architectures.
• Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) frameworks.
• Workflow orchestration and dependency management systems.
• Quantitative models and analytics platforms.
• Parallel or distributed computing.
• Cloud‑based infrastructure and platform services.
• Machine learning systems and model deployment frameworks.

About Us

UBS is a leading and truly global wealth manager and the leading universal bank in Switzerland. We also provide diversified asset management solutions and focused investment banking capabilities. Headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland, UBS is present in more than 50 markets around the globe.

We know that great work is never done alone. That’s why we place collaboration at the heart of everything we do. Because together, we’re more than ourselves.

We’re committed to disability inclusion and if you need reasonable accommodation/adjustments throughout our recruitment process, you can always contact us.

Salary information

The indicative gross base salary range as a full‑time equivalent role:

• United States - New York - New York min USD 233750 - max USD 251250 /annum

The expected salary for this role will be determined by relevant factors which may include but are not limited to, role‑required experience, qualifications, education, location and skill level. UBS offers a range of competitive benefits and we may, at our sole discretion, provide additional variable compensation or awards.

Join us

At UBS, we know that it's our people, with their diverse skills, experiences and backgrounds, who drive our ongoing success. We’re dedicated to our craft and passionate about putting our people first, with new challenges, a supportive team, opportunities to grow and flexible working options when possible. Our inclusive culture brings out the best in our employees, wherever they are on their career journey. And we use artificial intelligence (AI) to work smarter and more efficiently. We also recognize that great work is never done alone. That’s why collaboration is at the heart of everything we do. Because together, we’re more than ourselves.

We’re committed to disability inclusion and if you need reasonable accommodation/adjustments throughout our recruitment process, you can always contact us.

Disclaimer / Policy statements

UBS is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We respect and seek to empower each individual and support the diverse cultures, perspectives, skills and experiences within our workforce.