PayPal · 17 hours ago
Head of Venmo, Agentic AI
San Jose, CA
Full-time
Onsite
Director/Executive
$188K/yr - $324K/yr
8+ years expPayPal has been revolutionizing commerce globally for more than 25 years. The Head of Venmo, Agentic AI will oversee the strategic direction and execution of machine learning projects, working closely with data scientists and software engineers to enhance services through innovative AI/ML solutions.
E-Commerce PlatformsFinTechMobile PaymentsTransaction Processing
Responsibilities
Define and drive the strategic vision for machine learning initiatives within the team
Lead the development and optimization of machine learning models
Oversee the preprocessing and analysis of large datasets
Deploy and maintain ML solutions in production environments
Collaborate with cross-functional teams to integrate ML models into products and services
Monitor and evaluate the performance of deployed models, making necessary adjustments
Mentor and guide junior engineers and data scientists
Ensure adherence to best practices and industry standards in ML development
Lead and mentor a team of ML Scientists and Engineers, providing technical direction, career development, and regular feedback while fostering an inclusive, high-performing culture
Own the technical vision and roadmap for Venmo’s Agentic system, guiding the evolution of its reasoning, memory, and action layers to deliver dynamic, context-aware user experiences
Guide the design and implementation of fine-tuned large language models (LLMs) for Venmo-specific use cases, ensuring robust alignment, safety, personalization, and compliance with regulatory and risk standards
Drive the development and application of advanced LLM fine-tuning strategies, including supervised fine-tuning (SFT), direct preference optimization (DPO), and reinforcement learning methods such as GRPO, to continually improve agent quality, alignment, and user experience
Oversee adoption and extension of agentic frameworks such as A2A (Agent-to-Agent), MCP (Model Context Protocol), LangGraph, or similar, enabling complex, multi-agent interactions across the Venmo ecosystem
Provide technical leadership in context and prompt engineering, setting best practices for orchestrating multi-turn, multi-source interactions and ensuring high-quality, reliable responses
Partner closely with product, design, and platform engineering leaders to define Venmo’s next-generation Agentic product capabilities and AI interface roadmap, aligning your team’s work with business priorities and customer needs
Drive experimentation and innovation in reinforcement learning, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and online adaptation to improve agent behavior, personalization, and response quality
Establish and scale production-ready LLM and agentic pipelines, including data preparation, model training, evaluation, deployment, monitoring, and continuous improvement across your portfolio
Communicate strategy, results, and trade-offs to senior leadership and cross-functional stakeholders, influencing Venmo’s broader AI strategy and investment decisions
Recruit, onboard, and retain top talent, helping to build a world-class Agentic and LLM team within Venmo and across PayPal’s broader AI/ML community
Qualification
Required
8+ years relevant experience and a Bachelor's degree OR Any equivalent combination of education and experience
Experience leading others
Preferred
Master's degree (or higher) in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, or a related quantitative discipline
8+ years of relevant industry experience in ML/AI for consumer or financial applications
2+ years of experience leading ML/AI teams (managing senior ICs and/or junior managers)
Deep understanding of Transformer architectures and hands-on experience with fine-tuning LLMs for production use cases
Practical experience with modern LLM alignment and optimization techniques, such as supervised fine-tuning (SFT), direct preference optimization (DPO), and RL-based methods (e.g., GRPO), including designing training objectives, data pipelines, and evaluation strategies for these approaches
Strong proficiency in Python and ML frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, or JAX
Demonstrated experience with agentic frameworks such as A2A, MCP, LangGraph, or LangChain, and a solid understanding of Agent-Oriented Design patterns
Experience building context-aware conversational systems, integrating multi-source data for reasoning and response generation
Familiarity with evaluation methods for LLMs and agentic systems, including prompt testing, offline metrics, human feedback loops, and online experimentation
Proven experience with MLOps/LLMOps workflows, including model deployment, monitoring, and iterative retraining at scale
Track record of leading and scaling teams: setting clear goals, defining processes, grooming senior ICs, and supporting the growth of early-career talent
Excellent communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to influence cross-functional partners and senior stakeholders using clear narratives and data-driven insights
Benefits
Flexible work environment
Employee shares options
Health and life insurance
Company
PayPal
PayPal is a financial service company that provides online payment solutions to its users worldwide.
10001+ employees
H1B Sponsorship
PayPal has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships. Please note that this does not
guarantee sponsorship for this specific role. Below presents additional info for your
reference. (Data Powered by US Department of Labor)
Distribution of Different Job Fields Receiving Sponsorship
Represents job field similar to this job
Trends of Total Sponsorships
2025 (1144)
2024 (917)
2023 (775)
2022 (921)
2021 (1051)
2020 (1049)
Funding
Current Stage
Public CompanyTotal Funding
$12.17BKey Investors
Kohlberg Kravis RobertsBlueRun Ventures
2025-11-17Post Ipo Debt· $6.95B
2023-06-07Post Ipo Debt· $5B
2015-07-20IPO
Leadership Team
Simon Bladon
PayPal UK CEO
chaloem khompitoon
President & CEO
Recent News
2026-01-22
The Motley Fool
2026-01-22
2026-01-22
Company data provided by crunchbase