POST-DOC POSITION Telecom ParisTech – Safety Line

POSTDOCTORAL POSITION
possibly leading to a PERMANENT RESEARCH POSITION

Statistician, specialized in risk management

Context: Safety Line offers a permanent contract starting by a one-year post-doc
position co-supervised by the lab of Information and Communication Theory
(LTCI) of Telecom Paristech.

Safety Line is a French innovative company specialising in digital technology for risk
management. It develops statistical algorithms for data mining of data recorded in
flight by airlines (of the magnitude of hundreds of parameters per seconds per flight),
in order to contribute to solving complex problems such as the detection of “weak
signals” in anticipation of disasters. More precisely, from an operational point of view
it is crucial to be capable of identifying “risky sequence”, that is to say a combination
of actions and of phenomena that could lead to damages. In order to enhance the
performance of the analysis, supervised learning-based algorithms which are already
explored should be complemented by unsupervised methods. However, the data are
not well separable, therefore the goal of the research is to develop a general-purpose
detection framework to sort out “meaningful” types of sequences. By “meaningful
type of sequence” we mean a class of time-series which show comparable variations,
in order to point out non-consistent pilot actions for instance.

Activities & Responsibilities: The research topics include but are not limited to:

– Developing statistical and computational methodologies for the analysis of highdimensional
multivariate time-series (flight data or biomedial data), especially for
the risky sequence recognition problems;
– Integrating these methods in a software dedicated to the Risk Management.

From the scientific point of view, the performance of purely unsupervised
methodologies should be compared with semi-supervised learning techniques
integrating risk management expertise.
Deliverables are mainly routines and research reports that detail the performance
comparison between the various techniques used. A particular attention should be
given to the computing performance, in the perspective of an operational
implementation of the algorithms.
The computer developments are performed in C++ or Python, in order to facilitate the
possible embedding of algorithms in the C++ programs that are already in use.
Databases are of type SQL and NoSQL (MongoDB). An access to the computational
resources of Telecom’s lab is granted in order to take advantage of high-end
capabilities. Furthermore, Safety Line is developing its own high-performance
computation capability in collaboration with INRIA and GENCI.

Environment:
The post-doc shall be supervised by Prof. Stéphan Clémençon (Telecom ParisTech)
and Sébastien Travadel (Safety Line).

The LTCI groups all the research activities of Telecom ParisTech (Paris Institute of
Technology), which represents today approximately 160 permanent researchers and
teachers (among which 28 researchers of the National Center for Scientific Research
(CNRS), 270 Ph.D. students as well as 60 post-docs. The Statistics & Applications
Group of the LTCI enjoys a high national and international recognition with editorial
board members in high quality journals (Bernoulli, ESAIM P&S, the Journal of the
Royal Statistical Society, DSP journal) as well as regular participation as program
comity members in the major international conferences(IEEE ICASSP, International
Conference on Machine Learning).

Website:
http://www.ltci.telecom-°©‐paristech.fr/
Safety Line offers an exciting scientific environment to create cutting-edge solutions
for hazard prevention. The team brings together experts in risk management and
researchers in the fields of statistics & human performance. Strong collaborative links
with internationally recognized labs ensure a high-level research program. Indeed,
the company is actively interacting with high-profile scientists in mathematic fields
(statistical & optimization), high performance computation and clinical research on
human performance. The research and development team is a dynamic team of
young professionals dedicated to safety and sustainable development, which reflects
the core values of the firm.
While initially focused on aviation, the activity of the company is developing rapidly
and is now opening on new types of industrial risks. Website: www.safety-line.fr
The successful candidate will work in our Paris-based office (15, rue Jean-Baptiste
Berlier, 75013 Paris). The daily hours are 9 to 5 pm, 5 days a week. 5 weeks of
holidays granted. During the first year (post-doc), working time will be shared as
follows: 4 days/week in Safety Line’s premises, 1 day/week in LTCI’s facilities (37/39,
rue Dareau, 75014 Paris).
The team is multinational and the communication can be in English or in French.

Position Qualifications: Ph.D. in statistics or other relevant, closely related
quantitative field (statistical physics for instance), strong quantitative research
background, statistical and programming proficiency. We are seeking an individual
with a strong background in practical statistical machine learning and computation.

Salary range: 37 to 40 k€ per year + bonus.

Application deadline: 31/03/2013

Benefits: The position offers health coverage, unemployment benefits, pension
contribution and maternity leave.

Application: Applications should include a resumé, brief statements of research
interests, publication records and a link towards the Ph.D. thesis. Applications and
letters should be sent via electronic mail to:
clemenco@telecom-paristech.fr & sebastien.travadel@safety-line.fr