Distinguished, Data Scientist - Generative Media and Asset Creation

Company: Walmart
Location: Milpitas
Posted on: January 28, 2026

Job Description:

Position Summary What you'll do About the Role Walmart’s Next Gen Commerce team is pioneering the future of retail through immersive, AI-driven experiences that help customers explore, visualize, and engage with products in ways that are intuitive and inspiring. As a Distinguished Data Scientist focused on Generative Media and Asset Creation , you will play a core technical role in developing AI systems that generate rich visual content—including product imagery, themed media, videos, 3D assets, and motion graphics. Your mission is to build scalable, real-time generation pipelines that power customer-facing experiences such as virtual try-on, AR showrooms, and shoppable media. You’ll collaborate closely with product, engineering, design, and platform teams to ensure generation models are accurate, realistic, performant, and cost-effective. This is a high-impact IC role for someone who thrives at the intersection of generative AI, deep learning and production-ready implementation. Responsibilities Design and develop cutting-edge generative models across modalities including imagery, video, 3D, and stylized content Build scalable asset generation pipelines using diffusion models, transformer-based vision-language models, or 3D generation frameworks Prototype hybrid systems that integrate in-house models with open-source and third-party APIs to balance quality, speed, and operational cost Partner with media understanding teams to create feedback loops that improve generation realism, relevance, and content alignment Contribute to long-term model architecture decisions and training strategies for foundational and task-specific generation models Define and implement evaluation metrics for generative quality, perceptual realism, model efficiency, and end-user usability Collaborate with infrastructure and platform teams to ensure generated assets meet latency, size, and scalability requirements for customer applications Stay current with the latest advances in generative AI and translate them into practical product innovations Minimum Qualifications 7 years of experience in applied machine learning, computer vision, or generative AI, with a focus on media or content generation Hands-on experience developing and deploying generative models (e.g., diffusion models, GANs, autoregressive vision-language systems) Strong coding skills and familiarity with scalable ML pipelines and deployment frameworks Track record of delivering media or 3D generation capabilities into real-time or production systems Experience with model performance evaluation, perceptual metrics, and optimization for speed and quality Excellent collaboration skills, with the ability to work cross-functionally across research, engineering, product, and design teams Preferred Qualifications M.S. or Ph.D. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, or a related technical field Experience with AR/VR media generation, virtual try-on, or real-time rendering Familiarity with 3D mesh generation, keypoint-based conditioning, and texture synthesis Background in human-in-the-loop evaluation or responsible generative AI Contributions to open-source projects, research publications, or patents in the field of generative modeling Why Join Us? You’ll work at the frontier of generative AI, helping to shape the visual intelligence and storytelling layer of Walmart’s digital commerce platform. Your models will power experiences that redefine how millions of customers explore and shop—from static product views to immersive, personalized, media-rich interactions. About Walmart Global Tech Imagine working in an environment where one line of code can make life easier for hundreds of millions of people. That’s what we do at Walmart Global Tech. We’re a team of software engineers, data scientists, cybersecurity expert's and service professionals within the world’s leading retailer who make an epic impact and are at the forefront of the next retail disruption. People are why we innovate, and people power our innovations. We are people-led and tech-empowered. We train our team in the skillsets of the future and bring in experts like you to help us grow. We have roles for those chasing their first opportunity as well as those looking for the opportunity that will define their career. Here, you can kickstart a great career in tech, gain new skills and experience for virtually every industry, or leverage your expertise to innovate at scale, impact millions and reimagine the future of retail. Walmart’s culture is a competitive advantage, and it’s fostered by being together. Working together in person allows us to collaborate, align quickly and innovate with greater speed. We use our campuses to create purposeful connection rooted in deepening understanding and investing in the development of our associates. Our hubs: Walmart is a global company with offices across the United States and around the world. Our global headquarters is in Bentonville, Arkansas, with primary hubs in the San Francisco Bay area and New York/New Jersey. Benefits: Benefits: Beyond our great compensation package, you can receive incentive awards for your performance. Other great perks include 401(k) match, stock purchase plan, paid maternity and parental leave, PTO, multiple health plans, and much more. Equal Opportunity Employer: Walmart, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer – By Choice. We believe we are best equipped to help our associates, customers and the communities we serve live better when we really know them. That means understanding, respecting and valuing unique styles, experiences, identities, ideas and opinions – while being inclusive of all people. The above information has been designed to indicate the general nature and level of work performed in the role. It is not designed to contain or be interpreted as a comprehensive inventory of all responsibilities and qualifications required of employees assigned to this job. The full Job Description can be made available as part of the hiring process. At Walmart, we offer competitive pay as well as performance-based bonus awards and other great benefits for a happier mind, body, and wallet. Health benefits include medical, vision and dental coverage. Financial benefits include 401(k), stock purchase and company-paid life insurance. Paid time off benefits include PTO (including sick leave), parental leave, family care leave, bereavement, jury duty, and voting. Other benefits include short-term and long-term disability, company discounts, Military Leave Pay, adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, and more. ? ? ? You will also receive PTO and/or PPTO that can be used for vacation, sick leave, holidays, or other purposes. The amount you receive depends on your job classification and length of employment. It will meet or exceed the requirements of paid sick leave laws, where applicable. ? For information about PTO, see https://one.walmart.com/notices . ? ? Live Better U is a Walmart-paid education benefit program for full-time and part-time associates in Walmart and Sam's Club facilities. Programs range from high school completion to bachelor's degrees, including English Language Learning and short-form certificates. Tuition, books, and fees are completely paid for by Walmart. ? Eligibility requirements apply to some benefits and may depend on your job classification and length of employment. Benefits are subject to change and may be subject to a specific plan or program terms. ? For information about benefits and eligibility, see One.Walmart . ? Sunnyvale, California US-11656:The annual salary range for this position is $169,000.00-$338,000.00 ? Bentonville, Arkansas US-10735:The annual salary range for this position is $130,000.00-$260,000.00 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Additional compensation includes annual or quarterly performance bonuses. ? Additional compensation for certain positions may also include: ? ? - Stock ? ? Minimum Qualifications Outlined below are the required minimum qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no minimum qualifications. Option 1: Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Economics, Analytics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Information Technology or related field and 6 years' experience in an analytics related field. Option 2: Master’s degree in Statistics, Economics, Analytics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Information Technology or related field and 4 years' experience in an analytics related field. Option 3: 8 years' experience in an analytics or related field. Preferred Qualifications Outlined below are the optional preferred qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no preferred qualifications. Data science, machine learning, optimization models, PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Information Technology, Operations Research, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Econometrics, Publications or active peer reviewer in related journals or conference, Successful completion of one or more assessments in Python, Spark, Scala, or R, Using open source frameworks (for example, scikit learn, tensorflow, torch), We value candidates with a background in creating inclusive digital experiences, demonstrating knowledge in implementing Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standards, assistive technologies, and integrating digital accessibility seamlessly. The ideal candidate would have knowledge of accessibility best practices and join us as we continue to create accessible products and services following Walmart’s accessibility standards and guidelines for supporting an inclusive culture. Primary Location 1375 Crossman Ave, Sunnyvale, CA 94089-1114, United States of America

Keywords: Walmart, Davis , Distinguished, Data Scientist - Generative Media and Asset Creation, Science, Research & Development , Milpitas, California