Principal Data Scientist

Forward Deployed Principal Data Scientist

Software-Design and Development Apply now »

We help the world run better
At SAP, we keep it simple: you bring your best to us, and we'll bring out the best in you. We're builders touching over 20 industries and 80% of global commerce, and we need your unique talents to help shape what's next. The work is challenging – but it matters. You'll find a place where you can be yourself, prioritize your wellbeing, and truly belong. What's in it for you? Constant learning, skill growth, great benefits, and a team that wants you to grow and succeed. 

What you'll build 

In this role, you design, develop, and apply advanced data science, statistical, and machine learning methods to solve complex, business-critical problems. Embedded directly within customer environments and fast-moving delivery teams, you translate strategic and operational challenges into rigorous analytical solutions at speed. You work closely with customers to deliver scalable, enterprise-grade outcomes that drive measurable business value. You are accountable for the quality, impact, and delivery of complex analytical initiatives — acting as a subject-matter expert, managing ambiguity, and ensuring data-driven solutions are robust, reliable, and aligned with business objectives. 

In this role, you will: 

• Transform complex business challenges into data-driven intelligence by identifying high-value problems, framing them analytically, and engineering robust features and insights. 

• Design, develop, train, and implement mathematical models, algorithms, and machine learning solutions to solve complex business problems. 

• Apply advanced techniques across exploratory analysis, statistical modeling, experimentation, forecasting, segmentation, anomaly detection, causal analysis, and machine learning. 

• Integrate analytical and machine learning solutions into products, prototypes, or business processes, ensuring enterprise-grade scalability and robustness. 

• Define success metrics, quantify business impact, and translate analytical results into clear, actionable recommendations for decision-makers. 

• Lead or manage complex analytical workstreams or projects, including deliverables, milestones, risks, and escalations, as appropriate. 

• Communicate insights, trade-offs, and recommendations effectively to cross-functional teams and customer stakeholders, influencing decisions through evidence and expertise. 

• Work in an embedded, customer-facing setup, collaborating closely with customer teams to deeply understand their data, applications, and business context — co-developing impactful data and AI-driven solutions. 

What you bring: 

• 8 + years of expert-level proficiency in data science and machine learning, with strong command of Python and SQL, and the ability to design, validate, and optimize end-to-end analytical and ML solutions. 

• Hands-on expertise with Python and ML frameworks such as TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-learn, and XGBoost. 

• Deep applied knowledge of statistics and experimentation, including hypothesis testing, experimental design, causal inference, and uncertainty interpretation. 

• Proven experience applying a wide range of ML techniques — classification, forecasting, clustering, recommendation systems, anomaly detection — balancing accuracy, robustness, interpretability, and usability at scale. 

• Strong capability to translate ambiguous business questions into measurable analytical problems and connect model outputs to commercial, operational, or strategic decisions. 

• Experience delivering production-ready analytics and ML systems on modern data platforms, with a strong focus on data quality, governance, and reusability. 

• Exposure to SAP data landscapes including SAP S/4HANA, SAP BW/4HANA, SAP HANA Cloud, and familiarity with SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP), AI Core, AI Launchpad, and SAP AI services. 

• Ability to operate effectively in an Agentic AI context, contributing to the design, application, and responsible use of AI agents within complex business processes. 

• Advanced communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to influence senior stakeholders through clear data narratives and executive-ready insights. 

• You proactively leverage AI in everyday workflows, ensuring high-quality outputs through thoughtful context design and system integration. 

Where you belong: 

You will be part of a growing AI and industry expert team dedicated to serving customers across the Americas, Europe, and Asia. We bring together deep AI expertise, strong industry knowledge, and regional understanding to help customers innovate and lead in their markets. We work closely with decision-makers, challenge assumptions with data, and give data scientists room to influence strategy — not just produce analysis. This is a place for people who enjoy building something meaningful. You will thrive here if you are intellectually curious, customer-centric, and energized by the opportunity to drive real-world outcomes in a fast-evolving AI landscape.

Location: this is a hybrid position based from our New York City office located in the Hudson Yards.

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Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to their age, race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, age, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, et al), sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, protected veteran status, or disability.

Compensation Range Transparency: SAP believes the value of pay transparency contributes towards an honest and supportive culture and is a significant step toward demonstrating SAP’s commitment to pay equity. SAP provides the annualized compensation range inclusive of base salary and variable incentive target for the career level applicable to the posted role. The targeted annual combined range for this position is 176300-374200USD. The actual amount to be offered to the successful candidate will be within that range, dependent upon the key aspects of each case which may include education, skills, experience, scope of the role, location, etc. as determined through the selection process. Any SAP variable incentive includes a targeted dollar amount and any actual payout amount is dependent on company and personal performance. Please reference this link for a summary of SAP benefits and eligibility requirements: SAP North America Benefits.

AI Usage in the Recruitment Process

For information on the responsible use of AI in our recruitment process, please refer to our Guidelines for Ethical Usage of AI in the Recruiting Process.

Please note that any violation of these guidelines may result in disqualification from the hiring process.
Requisition ID: 457464  | Work Area: Software-Design and Development  | Expected Travel: 0 - 70%  | Career Status: Professional  | Employment Type: Regular Full Time   | Additional Locations:  #LI-Hybrid