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Salary: USD 130,600 - 236,200 / annual
Wave Mobile Money is building financial services for Africa, with a mission to make the continent cashless. The company operates across 9 African countries and has millions of users, backed by top-tier investors including Sequoia, Stripe, and Y Combinator.
You'll join as a Data Scientist embedded with product and operations teams, working on high-impact projects across the business. Your work will span credit scoring models, fraud detection optimization, field visit scheduling, and A/B testing for user promotions. You'll partner closely with product managers and business leaders to translate their challenges into data-driven solutions.
Key responsibilities include:
- Generate insights using customer, merchant, and internal data through statistical modeling, visualization, and machine learning
- Design and implement optimizations for internal operations, user promotions, and the agent network to help teams scale and reduce costs
- Build data-driven heuristics and ML models to improve user and business outcomes
- Own the full analytics lifecycle: scoping, design, implementation, and stakeholder communication
- Be embedded closely with product and operations teams to understand problems and deliver practical solutions
You'll be product-minded and scrappy, thinking about data in terms of intuitive user behaviors rather than black-box modeling. The role requires strong communication skills to translate complex findings for both technical and business audiences.
Wave provides a $1,200 yearly stipend for coworking and expects remote team members to travel to operational markets (e.g., Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire) at least once annually to understand users and the product. The company offers competitive salaries calculated transparently, generous equity, subsidized health insurance, 6 months paid parental leave, flexible vacation (30-40 days typical), and $10,000 annual charitable matching.
Candidates must be based in a talent hub country (US, UK, Spain, Kenya, Ghana) or an operating market in Africa (Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso).
**Requirements:**
- Bachelor's degree minimum in a quantitative field (Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, Computer Science, Engineering, or related); Master's or PhD preferred
- 5+ years of experience in data science, machine learning, or technical analytics roles
- Deep expertise with Python, SQL, and data visualization tools
- Experience in machine learning, causal inference, statistical modeling, or A/B testing; experience applying these in operational settings with offline components (e.g., field staff incentive structures) is a plus
- Highly effective written communication and presentation skills
- Track record of translating complex data into clear, actionable insights for technical and business stakeholders
- Fluency in English; French is a plus
- Bias for action and ability to thrive in ambiguous, fast-moving environments
- Experience in early-stage or rapidly scaling product teams, driving product decisions
- Excellent focus and prioritization using iterative approaches
- Ability to compellingly present findings and make proactive data-driven recommendations
