Artificial Intelligence Engineer I

Position: AI Engineer I

Location/Department: Richmond Headquarters/ Information Systems

Status: Full-Time/ Salaried Exempt

Our Company

Universal is headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, and is the leading global leaf tobacco supplier. Tobacco sourcing and processing has been the Company's principal focus since its founding in 1918. The largest portion of the Company's business involves procuring and processing flue-cured, burley, and dark air-cured leaf tobacco for manufacturers of consumer tobacco products. Over the past few years, Universal has expanded its business through a series of acquisitions to develop a plant-based ingredients business segment to support the food and beverage markets which will provide future growth opportunities for Universal. We are now a global business-to-business agri-products supplier to consumer product manufacturers, that sources and processes leaf tobacco and plant-based ingredients. Through our plant-based ingredients platform, we provide a variety of value-added manufacturing processes to produce high-quality, specialty vegetable- and fruit-based ingredients as well as botanical extracts and flavorings for human and pet food end markets.

Universal conducts business in over 30 countries on five continents and employs over 25,000 permanent and seasonal workers.

Domestically, Universal employs over 1,000 permanent and seasonal workers, and its revenues ending March 31, 2024, were $2.75 billion.

For more information on Universal, visit our website at www.universalcorp.com

Summary

As an AI Engineer I at Universal, you will design and develop scalable AI solutions that support business innovation and operational efficiency. You will contribute to the full lifecycle of AI systems—from prototyping and model training to performance testing and deployment. This role is ideal for early-career professionals with strong technical foundations and a passion for machine learning and big data technologies.

What You’ll Be Doing (Essential Duties)

• Design and develop scalable solutions using AI tools and machine learning models.
• Ensure the scalability, reliability, and performance of AI systems across diverse use cases.
• Develop and execute performance tests to evaluate system efficiency in handling large datasets, complex algorithms, and processing speeds.
• Perform research and testing to develop machine learning algorithms and predictive models.
• Utilize big data computation and storage tools to create prototypes and datasets.
• Conduct model training, evaluation, and tuning to optimize performance.
• Integrate, test, and monitor AI solutions in collaboration with cross-functional teams.
• Document technical workflows and contribute to knowledge sharing across the team.
• Stay current with emerging AI tools and technologies to support continuous improvement.

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• Proficiency in programming languages such as .net, Python, or R.
• Internship or project experience in AI/ML (demonstrates hands-on exposure)
• Basic understanding of statistics and data analysis
• Experience with SQL or NoSQL databases
• Ability to write clean, maintainable code and follow coding standards
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Effective communication and collaboration abilities.
• Typically reports to the AI Project Manager.

Preferred Skills

• Exposure to MLOps tools and practices.
• Experience with RESTful APIs or microservices
• Familiarity with containerization (Docker)
• Experience working in Agile/Scrum environments
• Experience with data visualization and version control (e.g., Power-BI, Git).

Benefits We offer a wide range of market-competitive total rewards that include 401(k) match, pension, merit increases, paid holidays, medical, dental, life, vision, short and long-term disability benefits, and tuition assistance to name a few.

EOE M/F/Disabled/Vet Employer

All applicants must be authorized to work in the United States.