Mission of the role:

Own AI products for Operations — end to end.

• Act as Product Owner for AI projects and products in Operations: vision, roadmap, backlog, and delivery with factories, functions, zones, IT, OT, and external partners.
• Understand the mechanics behind the product (data, models, architecture, workflow) — and the process around it.
• Be hands-on: work with data, build and evaluate models, and prototype solutions, not only coordinate others.
• Take use cases from ideation to deployment: change management, user coaching, and value tracking against the business case.
• Deliver PoCs, scale what works, kill what does not, and build in-house ML/GenAI capability.
• Define and run sustainable AI development and management practices in line with Responsible AI.

Product ownership

• Own the product roadmap for assigned AI products (ML platforms and GenAI solutions) and keep it aligned with Operations priorities and the business case.
• Translate business problems into use cases, data needs, model choices, and a sequenced backlog.
• Run the product with cross-functional teams: process / IWS, OT, data, IT, factories, and partners. Decide what is in, what is out, and when it is good enough to go live.
• Set acceptance criteria, go-live criteria, and model-evaluation standards. Challenge black-box delivery until mechanics and quality are understood.

Hands-on ML / data / GenAI

• Work with industrial data: tags, historians, time series, data gaps, cleansing, feature engineering.
• Build, train, evaluate, and iterate models (anomaly detection, predictive / remaining-useful-life style use cases, classical ML, and GenAI).
• Ensure a consistent, state-of-the-art architecture across products; experiment with new ML/GenAI techniques and bring them into the stack (Azure / Databricks and related tools).
• Deliver in-house solutions and integrations; test, troubleshoot, and debug until they work in a plant context.

Users, change, value

• Work with users from ideation to deployment: workshops, shadowing on the line, demos, training, hypercare.
• Drive change management so alerts and tools are used — not only installed. Coach key users and application owners.
• Track value (e.g. unplanned downtime, PR, quality, cost) versus the business case; feed results back into roadmap and model priorities.
• Document learnings and best practices so successful products can be scaled to further sites/lines.

Lab / CoE

• Animate the centre of excellence and AI self-service where it helps adoption.
• Mentor others and grow in-house capability so Operations is not dependent on a single expert or vendor.

Indicative KPIs

• Roadmap delivery: committed site/line onboardings and product increments on time.
• Model / product quality: agreed evaluation criteria met before go-live; alert precision/usefulness in operation.
• Adoption: share of modelled assets / target users actually using the product (actioned alerts, active companions).
• Value: realized vs business-case impact , with a clear measurement method.
• Lab throughput: PoCs taken to a working product or explicitly stopped, with documented learnings (indicative ~4–5 prototypes/year, 2–3 months each).

Skills needed for the role

• Product ownership in a technical domain: roadmap, backlog, prioritization, stakeholder management, and the ability to say no. Comfortable as the single owner of an AI product, not as a pure project coordinator.
• Solid ML foundation: supervised/unsupervised learning, time-series and anomaly detection, feature engineering, model evaluation, and the judgement to choose the right model for the loss — not the most fashionable one.
• Hands-on with data: exploratory analysis, industrial/OT data (sensors, tags, historians), data quality, and working with process engineers on loss trees and critical equipment.
• GenAI literacy: foundation models, orchestration (e.g. LangChain / similar), and when GenAI is the right tool vs classical ML.
• Proficiency in at least one language used for data/ML work (Python preferred; Java/C# a plus). Comfortable writing code, not only slides.
• Experience with cloud data/ML platforms (preferably Azure, Databricks).
• Change management and user empathy: can work with operators, maintainers, supply chain, procurement and leadership from idea through go-live.
• Value tracking: can turn a use case into a measurable business case and keep score after deployment.
• Strong collaboration and communication: explain models and trade-offs to non-technical stakeholders; work with IT, Data, OT, and partners.
• Innovative but pragmatic: experiment fast, stay current, ship what plants will use.
• Fluent English.

• Bachelor’s or Master’s in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science, Industrial Engineering, or a related field. PhD is a plus; equivalent hands-on experience equally valued.
• Professional experience in IT/Data/AI, with a mix of machine learning delivery and product ownership (or a technical lead who has owned a product end to end).
• Demonstrated experience taking an ML or AI solution from idea to users in a live operational environment — including messy data, model iteration, and adoption — not only a notebook or a vendor demo.
• Experience with industrial or operations context is a strong plus (manufacturing, maintenance, process, OT/IT).
• Experience working with cross-functional teams, plants/sites, and external partners.
• Experience with cloud platforms (Azure, AWS, or GCP) and with programming/frameworks used in ML and backend development.
• Project/product delivery track record: multiple workstreams, clear priorities, on-time delivery.

At Danone we are committed to our mission “bringing health, through food to as many people as possible”. We are working together to make sure that our brands, like Hipro, Nutricia, Alpro, Activia, Nutrilon and Evian, create real benefits for people, communities and the planet. You will be part of one of the largest Certified B Corps™ in the world. Being B Corp means to be part of a select movement of companies verified to be meeting the highest standards of social and environmental criteria and using business as a force for good. One Planet. One Health.

We offer:

All Danoners receive a complete package of benefits. This includes a competitive salary and yearly bonus, a premium free pension, 30 days of annual leave (with the opportunity to purchase more) and you will receive a monthly health care allowance. In addition, you can get discount on your gym membership, and we offer initiatives focused on nutrition, physical, and mental health. We provide continuous learning opportunities through workshops, online courses and training sessions.

In the Netherlands we also offer a hybrid working environment which enables each team to meet our people's desire for flexibility. You can work from one of our People Hubs in Hoofddorp, Utrecht and Rijswijk or you can work from home.

What's next:

It’s simple – hit the “apply” button before the application deadline of 22nd Sept 2026. In order to comply with GDPR we can’t process your personal data without your given consent, so please apply directly via this website. Good luck! We can’t wait to meet you.

We put people at the center of everything we do. Bring your unique perspective, ambitions and ideas to the table – the impact you could make might surprise you. We are committed to embrace diversity, nurturing an inclusive workplace where every individual is valued; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is deeply embedded in Danone's DNA.

Need more information? Please contact Fariha Samad, Talent Manager, at fariha.samad@danone.com

* All applications will be considered for a vacancy without discrimination based on ethnicity, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, nationality, disability, or any other protected status.

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