Data Scientist, Marketplace

Discretion is one of Wheely’s core values — where people travel, and who they travel with, is at their discretion. We respect their private life and their actions. Wheely has in the past refused to hand over requests to share passenger/journey data to governments, and we will continue to honour our commitment. This has led us to start developing technology in 2020 to put our clients’ movements beyond our own reach.

Marketplace

The Marketplace team is responsible for matching passenger requests with available chauffeurs. Their areas of responsibility are pricing, dispatching/matching protocols and incentives. Their success criteria are to maximise welfare (i.e. reliability, utilisation) and to avoid a known failure mode of ride-hailing marketplaces known as the wild goose chase.

Scientists in the Marketplace

While there are existing capabilities, including an app with heuristic dispatch capabilities, that have aided with our success so far we now need to deepen our understanding of our marketplace and embed prediction & optimisation throughout it. We’re looking for a talented Data Scientist to join to define metrics, produce insights & predictive models and ultimately introduce practices from empirical science as needed to achieve our future ambitions. 

This is a unique opportunity for talented, commercially and user oriented scientists to develop core marketplace capabilities in a mature and profitable company with a unique customer base and take on ride hailing. 

Strong preference will be given to those who have 2+ years experience in a similar role at another ride hailing company. 

What you’ll do in the next 12 months 

• Define and make readily available the Wheely Marketplace metrics: Work with the Data Analysts and leadership in the Marketplace team to establish holistic metric frameworks to measure performance of initiatives from all perspectives in the marketplace (e.g. Chauffeurs, passengers and Wheely). Develop the internal self-service reporting capability for the marketplace team and Wheely leadership to track the metrics on a daily basis (e.g. batch hourly, daily but not real-time).
  
  
• Produce insights and make recommendations: Segment the driver allocation and dispatch problems (e.g. Airport, rural, urban rush hour, festival days etc), establish baseline performance and work with the Marketplace team to propose 3 hypotheses to improve marketplace performance across the segments. 
  
  
• Establish prediction problems and develop offline models: For example, build a trip demand forecast as an input to daily driver dispatch by area and work with product teams to develop features and incentives as needed to implement it within next 3-6 months (e.g. notifications along with x pounds to drive in this area this week). 
  
  
• Work cross functionally to ensure scientific control in marketplace metrics: Bring your insights, models and capabilities to the Marketplace team to ensure we can make controlled improvements in any marketplace metric metric through controlled changes in other metrics (e.g. to increase utilisation by X, we increase price by Y). Work with Marketplace engineers to ensure we have a platform that enables us to develop insights and implement the predictive models as needed to power and continuously improve our Marketplace performance overtime. 
  
  
• Help pave the way for more scientists. Identify gaps in Science capability based on the challenges you’re facing and your past experience (e.g. economists, data scientists, user researchers, operations researchers, ML engineers, etc). Work with your line manager to create a case for hiring those capabilities.
  
  
• Own your role and create your own path: Connect with the team, understand the company goals (e.g. OKRs) and your role; Align with your line manager and team about how you will contribute and any critical dependencies you’ll have. Based on what you’ve learned about Wheely and your understanding of the domain, propose 1 new OKR and/or 2-3 features/projects that ensure the impact of Science on Marketplace objectives in 2024.

Requirements

• Degree in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, or Mathematics.
• Experience in Operations Research or Economics is a plus.
• Preferably experience of turning algorithms into production systems.
• Proficiency in SQL.
• Strong programming skills in Python or similar language.

What we Offer

Wheely expects the very best from our people, both on the road and in the office. In return, employees enjoy flexible working hours, stock options and an exceptional range of perks and benefits.

• Office-based role located in West London
  
• Competitive salary & equity package
• Medical insurance, including dental
• Life and critical illness insurance
• Monthly credit for Wheely journeys
• Lunch allowance
• Professional development subsidies
• Cycle to work scheme 
• Top-notch equipment
• Relocation allowance (dependent on role level)
• Wheely has an in-person culture but allows flexible working hours and work from home when needed.