PhD Software Engineer Intern, Machine Learning & Optimization

Job Description

About the Job

We’re looking for PhD candidates in the machine learning and optimization domain to intern with our Delivery Marketplace team during summer 2026 (12 weeks). This is a unique opportunity for graduate students to gain real-world experience at a leading technology company.

You will be embedded in an engineering team and work closely with other specialists, data scientists, and product managers. As a PhD intern, you will work on an exciting yet bold problem independently, under the supervision of an experienced engineer on that team.

About The Role

At Uber, we work on many ambitious engineering products covering a wide range of business lines, as well as the underlying platform technologies that power those businesses. We foster growth and increase profitability of Uber by pushing the frontiers of machine learning, constrained optimization, statistics, data science, and economics. We also focus on developing highly reliable and scalable platforms to accelerate Uber’s impact on the transportation industry.

As a PhD software engineer intern, you will have ample opportunities to collaborate with product managers, data scientists, and engineers from various teams. You will gain invaluable experience learning how to iterate over a product for greater success while demonstrating your area of expertise (machine learning, statistics, constrained optimization, distributed systems, etc.). This is a unique opportunity to grow your skills with real-world experience and do highly impactful, yet fun work at the same time. It is an ambitious yet rewarding job!

About The Team: Delivery Marketplace

The Delivery Marketplace team, specifically focusing on Consumer and Courier Pricing, Matching and Logistics, is responsible for building the core technology across Uber’s delivery line of business. This includes critical services like food delivery, grocery, and retail last mile.

The team undertakes a diverse set of transformational projects and impactful products, ranging from finding the optimal match between jobs and earners in the delivery space, to setting optimal prices for Eaters and Couriers. The organization is formed of talented teams of engineers and scientists working side by side on state-of-the-art innovations in matching objective functions, pricing algorithms, and promotions. To achieve these goals, we leverage big data tools and apply advanced machine learning models to drive both top-line and bottom-line business outcomes.

What You’ll Do

• Drive exciting, ambitious, previously unsolved projects from end to end
• Develop novel algorithms that use Uber data at a global scale
• Thrive in an environment with ambiguous product requirements
• Collaborate closely with product managers and data scientists
• Be motivated to independently own and drive projects forward
• Have a passion to make Uber better for our customers

Qualifications

Basic Qualifications

• Currently enrolled in a Ph.D. program studying computer science, machine learning, data mining, artificial intelligence, constrained optimization, statistics, or a related quantitative field
• Candidates must have at least one semester/quarter of their education left following the internship

Preferred Qualifications

• Knowledge of underlying technical foundations of statistics, machine learning, optimization, systems, etc.
• Experience in one or more object-oriented languages, including C++, Java, Python, or Go
• Ability to communicate effectively with both technical and business partners
• Experience in simplifying/converting business problems into technical problems
• Research mentality with a bias towards action to structure a project from idea to experimentation to prototype to implementation

Compensation (Sunnyvale, CA)

For Sunnyvale, CA-based roles: The base hourly rate amount for this role is USD$67.00 per hour. You will also be eligible for various benefits.