Founded in 2009, Zest AI has been pioneering innovative AI technology with a mission to expand credit access to create opportunities for more Americans to pursue their financial goals. Zest AI is transforming the $17 trillion US consumer credit market by delivering AI technology that helps lenders identify creditworthy borrowers overlooked by traditional methods, while leveling the playing field so financial institutions of all sizes can harness AI to provide better lending experiences.

With over 50 issued and pending patents across automation, accuracy, performance, and model explainability, Zest AI is a leader in financial technology, providing financial institutions with AI tools that create a more resilient US financial system and a stronger U.S. economy. With over 600 active AI models, financial institutions rely on Zest AI's comprehensive suite of solutions spanning marketing, underwriting, fraud detection, lending intelligence, and more to make smarter lending decisions while improving profitability. This US-based technology as a service company is headquartered in Los Angeles, California.

Data Scientists at Zest AI use the power of machine learning (ML) and statistical analysis to build, test, deploy, and monitor financial underwriting models. These models are providing fairer and transparent access to credit and have already had a substantial impact - scoring millions of Americans on over $180B in assets. By leveraging a combination of ML and vast amounts of data points, Zest seeks to challenge traditional credit scoring models, while expanding our proprietary AI-explainability technology across the fintech industry.

In this role you will:

• Own the strategy, roadmap, and execution for the core API platform serving internal and external customers
• Define, prioritize, and deliver API features and platform improvements that increase usability, reliability, scalability, and data integrity
• Translate complex engineering and data requirements into clear product priorities and business outcomes
• Partner closely with engineering and SRE teams to drive operational excellence across reliability, observability, performance, and scalability
• Lead cross-functional collaboration with engineering, data science, and customer-facing teams to scope and prioritize high-impact initiatives
• Establish and track KPIs for API adoption, uptime, latency, and data availability, and use metrics to guide product decisions
• Drive operational roadmap initiatives including CI/CD improvements, logging, monitoring, and infrastructure enhancements
• Define and prioritize data lifecycle workflows, including real-time data handling and archiving to support model training and analytics
• Communicate priorities, tradeoffs, and roadmap progress clearly to executive, technical, and non-technical stakeholders

We are looking for:

• 3+ years of product management experience, ideally focused on API products, platforms, or infrastructure
• Strong technical background, with prior experience as a software engineer, solutions architect, or similar technical role preferred
• Experience with API lifecycle management and platform product ownership
• Familiarity with cloud infrastructure and SRE/observability practices, including monitoring, alerting, and incident management
• Demonstrated ability to balance customer needs, internal requests, and technical debt reduction in roadmap decisions
• Proven success working cross-functionally with engineering, data science, and operations partners
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain technical concepts to diverse audiences
• A product mindset that treats reliability, maintainability, and platform quality as core product features

Success in this role looks like:

• Aligning engineering investments with measurable business outcomes
• Maintaining a clear, data-driven roadmap that balances feature delivery with operational health
• Raising the bar for API quality, reliability, and platform maturity over time

About Zest AI:

Creating a diverse and inclusive culture where all are welcomed, valued, and empowered to achieve our full potential is important to who we are and where we’re headed in the future. We know that unique backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives help us think bigger, spark innovation, and succeed together. Zest is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion and encourages professionals from underrepresented groups in technology and financial services to apply.

Our core values are Communication, Collaboration, Bias for Action, Client-centricity, and Heart. Learn more at Zest.ai, follow us on LinkedIn (linkedin.com/company/zest-ai/) or Twitter @Zest_AI, or check out our Insights blog (https://www.zest.ai/cms/insights).