Product Development Automation Lead

The Product Development Automation Lead plays a key role in renewing the research and production strategy of Wageningen Food Views (WFV). This role focuses on developing and implementing AI solutions that accelerate and automate the calculation of scores within various Food Views products. The position operates within DSI’s central metadata‑driven data architecture, where data quality, governance, version control and traceability are essential principles.

The Automation Lead combines AI expertise with a strong understanding of data management and workflow‑driven processing, developing sustainable automation solutions that can be deployed across the WSER‑wide data infrastructure.

The Product Development Automation Lead works closely with data scientists, domain experts and product teams to establish a new standard for data‑driven insights in the food and sustainability sector, fundamentally transforming the WFV business model.

Your key tasks and responsibilities:

• Develops and implements AI‑driven automation solutions
  Builds and integrates AI components (e.g. classification, extraction, validation, semantic enrichment) within DSI’s metadata‑driven architecture to accelerate and standardise calculations, scoring models and data processing.
• Designs and maintains scalable dimensional data models
  Responsible for designing, maintaining and applying dimensional data models that translate research and production data into consistent, traceable and reusable datasets, improving the data quality of WFV products.
• Standardises and optimises research and production processes
  Develops sustainable automation patterns reusable across multiple research and product domains, structurally reducing research costs while increasing update frequency and product coverage.
• Works closely with data scientists, domain experts and product teams
  Aligns with researchers, business development and the Data & AI Expertise Team; translates substantive needs into technical solutions and contributes to an integrated WSER‑wide data infrastructure.
• Contributes actively to the strategic growth of Wageningen Food Views
  Deploys AI technology to replace repetitive work, improves the quality and reliability of indicators and scores, and directly contributes to the scalability, innovation capacity and market impact of WFV.

Your Team
The new colleague will work within the DSI team of WSER and participate in the core team of Wageningen Food Views. You will collaborate with researchers, domain experts, business development, and the data management team (AI expertise, data scientists, and product teams). The role is an integral part of WSER’s central data and AI infrastructure.

Your Workplace
Wageningen Social & Economic Research (WSER) employs around 390 staff across locations in The Hague, Wageningen and Lelystad, as well as several smaller regional offices. They work within 11 research teams on multidisciplinary projects tackling complex socio‑economic challenges, such as climate, healthy and safe food, sustainable living environments and sustainable incomes in the Netherlands and beyond.
One of these 11 teams is Data Science and Information Management (DSI).

DSI (approx. 30 colleagues) specialises in Data Science, Business Informatics, Digital Governance, Digital Innovation Ecosystems, Data‑Driven Business Models, and the Ethical, Legal & Social Aspects of AI. DSI collaborates with all other research groups on market‑oriented research within WSER’s broad domain. Together with other WSER groups, DSI works nationally and internationally for governments, NGOs and the business community.

You are / have / can:

• Advanced AI expertise (LLM/NLP/ML): Skilled in fine‑tuning, prompt engineering, model evaluation and automating text and data processing, with experience in frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow and HuggingFace.
• Data management & workflow engineering:
  Proficient in designing and integrating AI solutions within metadata‑driven workflows, API integrations and (pre‑)dimensional data modelling in complex data architectures.
• Strong programming and engineering skills:
  Experienced in advanced Python and C#/.NET, with knowledge of modern software practices such as Git, CI/CD and MLOps for scalable and reliable model deployment.
• Quality and product assurance:
  Able to evaluate model performance, reliability and bias systematically, and effectively integrate AI solutions into products and data‑driven processes.
• Strategic, analytical and technical leadership:
  Combines innovation, problem‑solving abilities and results‑orientation with the capacity to design, assess and apply AI solutions at scale, shaping technical decisions and product development.

You also have:

• A Master’s degree in Data Science, AI/ML, Computer Science, Software Engineering, Applied Mathematics or Food Technology with a strong data component; a PhD in a relevant AI domain is a strong advantage.
• AI and automation expertise: several years’ experience developing, implementing and scaling AI solutions such as LLMs, NLP models and data‑driven automation processes.
• Experience with data‑driven research or production environments, including automating research, analytics or production workflows and building reliable, reproducible and scalable data processes.
• Experience working with researchers, data scientists, product teams and business stakeholders and able to translate needs into technical AI solutions.
• Experience within knowledge institutions or organisations in the food or sustainability sector is beneficial but not required.

If you see challenges in this role — you may also see opportunities for development. If you do not yet fully match the requested track record but do have solid relevant experience, we warmly encourage you to apply.

Wageningen University & Research offers excellent terms of employment. A few highlights from our Collective Labour Agreement include:

• working hours that can be discussed and arranged so that they allow for the best possible work-life balance;
• sabbatical leave, study leave, and partially paid parental leave;
• there is a strong focus on vitality and you can make use of the sports facilities available on campus for a small fee;
• a fixed year-end bonus of 8,3%;
• excellent pension scheme.

In addition to these first-rate employee benefits, you will of course receive a good salary. We offer, depending on your experience, a competitive gross salary of between €4.045,- and €63228,- for a full-time working week of 36 hours, in accordance with the CLA Wageningen Research (scale 11). Additionally, For this role a contract for 32 hours can be discussed. As for your contract, we initially offer a one-year contract that can be extended - if possible within (company) organizational circumstances - on good performance. Of course, we are happy to have a conversation with you if you have any questions about this.

Wageningen University & Research offers plenty of opportunities for growth and development, with a strong internal recruitment policy and excellent training programmes.

You will work on the greenest and most innovative campus in the Netherlands, in an international and open working environment. For 20 consecutive years, we have been voted the "best university" in the Netherlands! A place to be proud of.

The mission of Wageningen University & Research is “To explore the potential of nature to improve the quality of life”. Under the banner Wageningen University & Research, Wageningen University and the specialised research institutes of the Wageningen Research Foundation have joined forces in contributing to finding solutions to important questions in the domain of healthy food and living environment. With its roughly 30 branches, 7,600 employees (6,700 fte) and 13,100 students and over 150,000 participants to WUR’s Life Long Learning, Wageningen University & Research is one of the leading organisations in its domain. The unique Wageningen approach lies in its integrated approach to issues and the collaboration between different disciplines.

Read the 5 reasons why your future colleagues enjoy working at WUR and watch the video below to get an idea of our green campus!

We will recruit for the vacancy ourselves, so no employment agencies please. However, sharing in your network is appreciated.

Wageningen University & Research is the university and research centre for life sciences. The themes we deal with are relevant to everyone around the world and Wageningen, therefore, has a large international community and a lot to offer to international employees.

Because we expect you to work and live in the Netherlands our team of advisors on Dutch immigration procedures will help you with the visa application procedures for yourself and, if applicable, for your family. If you come with a partner, we offer a Dual Career group program organized by our Welcome Center. This program helps your partner to get familiar with the Dutch culture, labour market and assists your partner to find a job.

Feeling welcome also has everything to do with being well informed. Wageningen University & Research's International Community page contains practical information about what we can do to support international employees coming to Wageningen. Furthermore, our Welcome Center can assist you with any additional advice and information about for example housing, opening a bank account or schooling. Finally, certain categories of international staff may be eligible for a tax exemption on a part of their salary during the first five years in the Netherlands.