48 AI Research jobs in South Africa

We're looking for a dynamic
AI Software Development Facilitator
to join our team — someone who can guide, mentor, and inspire the next generation of developers in AI technologies and modern software practices.

Key Responsibilities

• Facilitate interactive sessions and workshops on AI concepts, programming, and software development.
• Provide hands-on guidance in Python, Machine Learning frameworks and software engineering best practices.
• Develop and update learning materials aligned with current industry trends.
• Evaluate student progress and provide constructive feedback.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related field
• 5 plus years of experience in facilitating in AI, data science, or software development.
• Excellent facilitation, communication, and mentoring skills.
• Passionate about teaching and continuous learning.
• Exposure to generative AI tools (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, etc.).

Apply now

Send your updated CV to - with the subject line
"AI Software Development Facilitator Application."

Role: AI-Powered Product Development & Creative Operations Coordinator

Location: 100% Remote

Schedule: Monday to Friday, 8:00am to 5:00pm PST

About the client

A vibrant lifestyle brand known for its bold, nostalgic aesthetic and playful character-led designs. The company offers a wide array of accessories, tech gear, beauty items, and collaborative product lines with other creative brands.

Its offerings often feature signature whimsical characters, holographic finishes, and a strong pop-culture vibe. The brand maintains a high level of community engagement and frequently launches limited-edition drops and themed collections, appealing both to long-time fans and new generations who love creative, expressive style.

About the role

We are seeking a visionary, tech-savvy, and highly organized individual to join our team as an AI-Powered Product Development & Creative Operations Coordinator. This unique role is central to revolutionizing our product development lifecycle by integrating artificial intelligence into our creative processes. The ideal candidate will leverage AI as a core partner to accelerate creative exploration, refine design concepts with data-driven insights, and optimize our entire creative operations workflow.

This role requires a blend of creative thinking and meticulous organization, with a passion for utilizing AI tools to generate concepts, streamline timelines, and unlock new possibilities in product design.

1. AI-Driven Creative Development & Design Exploration

• AI Concept Generation: Operate AI concept generation tools (e.g., Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, DALL-E 3) to rapidly produce diverse product designs, themes, and visual concepts.
• Prompt Engineering & AI Concept Artistry: Utilize prompt engineering to guide AI in creating targeted, brand-aligned design variations, effectively acting as an "AI Concept Artist" to visualize new ideas.
• Data-Driven Design Selection: Employ AI analysis tools to refine design options based on predefined criteria, historical performance data, and market trends.
• Innovation Facilitation: Present AI-generated concepts to creative and product teams during brainstorming sessions, using them as catalysts for innovation and iteration.
• Asset Management: Build and maintain a comprehensive library of AI-generated assets, prompts, and styles to support continuous creative development.

2. Creative Operations & Project Management

• Central Project Hub: Serve as the central point of contact for all creative project timelines, from initial concept through to final delivery.
• Workflow Management: Implement and manage project management software (e.g., Asana, Jira, Trello) to meticulously track tasks, deadlines, and deliverables for the product development and design teams.
• Efficiency Enhancement: Proactively identify bottlenecks in the creative workflow and propose AI-powered or process-based solutions to enhance efficiency.
• Cross-Functional Coordination: Coordinate and communicate effectively across departments—including design, marketing, engineering, and external vendors—to ensure seamless project execution and alignment.
• Request Prioritization: Manage the intake of new creative requests and prioritize them based on strategic goals and available resources.

3. AI-Powered Process Optimization

• Tool Integration: Research and integrate new AI tools that assist with mood board creation, trend forecasting, and competitive analysis.
• Task Automation: Explore and implement AI solutions for automating repetitive tasks within the creative workflow (e.g., file organization, basic resizing, version control).
• Performance Tracking: Track and report on key performance indicators for the creative process, such as concept-to-final time, number of iterations, and project throughput, leveraging data to drive continuous improvements.

Qualifications and Experience

• Experience: 2+ years in a creative operations, project coordination, or junior product design role.
• AI Portfolio: A strong portfolio or case studies demonstrating hands-on experience with AI image generation tools (Midjourney, DALL-E, etc.) for conceptual design work.
• Organizational Skills: Exceptional organizational and project management skills, with proficiency in tools like Asana, Jira, or Trello.
• Communication: Excellent communication and collaboration skills to effectively bridge the gap between creative vision and operational execution.
• Creative Eye: A keen creative eye with the ability to articulate feedback and guide AI output toward a desired aesthetic.

Preferred:

• Educational Background: Background or education in Design, Fine Arts, Project Management, or a related field.
• Product Development Knowledge: Understanding of fundamental product development lifecycle stages.
• Prompt Engineering Expertise: Experience with prompt engineering techniques to achieve specific and consistent AI-generated results.
• Data Analysis: Basic knowledge of data analysis to interpret trends and inform design decisions.
• Additional AI Tools: Familiarity with other AI tools for video, 3D modeling, or copywriting is a plus.

Personal Attributes

• Innovative & Curious: A relentless experimenter excited by the potential of AI to transform creativity.
• Efficiency-Obsessed: Naturally seeks out ways to automate and improve processes.
• Bridge Builder: Thrives on connecting people, ideas, and technology.
• Adaptable & Agile: Comfortable in a fast-paced environment where tools and best practices evolve rapidly.
• Detail-Oriented: Meticulous in managing timelines, assets, and communication.

A specialised AI consulting firm is seeking a Machine Learning Engineer to join our team. This role offers the opportunity to work on high-impact AI initiatives within the banking sector , where you will play a key part in designing, deploying, and scaling advanced machine learning solutions. You’ll collaborate with data scientists, engineers, and business stakeholders to deliver end-to-end AI systems that enhance decision-making, improve customer experiences, and optimise critical processes. Beyond building models, you’ll be responsible for ensuring their performance, reliability, and scalability in production—using modern cloud platforms and MLOps practices.

Responsibilities:

• Design, build, and optimise machine learning models for banking applications.
• Implement scalable ML pipelines and integrate them into production environments.
• Collaborate with data scientists, data engineers, and business stakeholders to deliver end-to-end AI solutions.
• Deploy, monitor, and maintain ML models in AWS environments .
• Ensure model reliability, reproducibility, and performance throughout the lifecycle.
• Document methodologies, workflows, and best practices.

Qualifications and experience:

• 3–5 years of experience in machine learning, data science, or related field.
• Strong proficiency in Python and ML frameworks (TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-learn).
• Experience with large datasets and SQL/NoSQL databases .
• Essential: Hands-on experience with AWS cloud services (SageMaker, S3, Lambda, EC2, Glue, Redshift).
• Familiarity with MLOps practices and CI/CD for ML pipelines.
• Strong problem-solving ability with a track record of translating business needs into technical solutions.
• Experience in banking or financial services is advantageous, but not required.
• Proven experience taking AI models into production at scale .
• Exposure to containerisation (Docker, Kubernetes).
• Familiarity with ML model monitoring and observability tools.

The reference number for this position is NG60802 which is a contract position in Johannesburg/Cape Town offering a contract rate of R550 to R750 per hour, salary negotiable based on experience. e-mail Nokuthula on or call her for a chat on to discuss this and other opportunities.

Are you ready for a change of scenery? E-Merge IT recruitment is a niche recruitment agency. We offer our candidates options so that we can successfully place the right people with the right companies, in the right roles. Check out the E-Merge IT website for more great positions.

Do you have a friend who is a developer or technology specialist? We pay cash for successful referrals!

Part-time, remote, mostly equity compensation, to be founder of an AI productivity startup.

Are you a results-driven business development professional with a passion for connecting with small to medium-sized digital companies? Do you thrive on introducing innovative solutions that enhance productivity?

We are a productivity company offering AI-based project management SaaS and coaching/consulting on Agile methodologies and Getting Things Done (GTD) practices. Our work helps both individuals and organizations become more focused, effective, and aligned. We are now looking for a
Business Development & Cofounder (SaaS Focus)
to help us expand our reach and grow our client base.

Your Mission as Business Development & Cofounder
You'll be a key driver in our growth, directly engaging with potential clients and shaping our market presence. Key tasks include:

• Identifying and contacting small to medium-sized companies that primarily work digitally.
• Introducing them to our AI-based project management SaaS and/or our productivity and Agile coaching services.
• Building relationships and securing trials/engagements for our products and services.
• Contributing to overall business strategy and market positioning.
• Being co-director of our non-profit.

Ideal Skills & Background

• Proven experience in business development, sales, or client acquisition, preferably in SaaS or a related digital service industry.
• Strong communication skills.
• Self-motivated with a strong ability to work independently and remotely.
• Bonus if you have a foundational understanding of Agile methodologies (Scrum, Kanban) or productivity systems (GTD).

Our Cooperative Structure
We operate as a cooperative, not a traditional startup. That means we are a team of cofounders who share ownership and company-wide revenue based on contribution.

• You will earn equity in the company, like all other cofounders.
• You will also receive a direct revenue share from the clients you personally acquire.
• Time commitment is flexible, with part-time contributions welcomed.
• As the company grows, cash payouts will increase proportionally.

About Us
We are a productivity startup focused on helping individuals and organizations implement Agile planning, GTD, and smart execution systems. Our mission is to bring clarity, momentum, and accountability to people's work. We are about to launch an AI-first project management system.

Time Commitment & Compensation

• Start with as little as 2 hours per week.
• Compensation includes equity and revenue share.
• Initial cash payouts are limited to 10%, with the rest in equity and revenue share.
• Important Note:
  As long as we are not making significant revenue or have not secured external investment, there will be no or very little cash payment. This is an opportunity to build a startup. However, in term of equity you are getting the same deal as e ery other cofounder. So you really can become a major owner of the company, in case you are willing to contribute your work.

Company Ownership
Our structure allows contributors to build up real ownership in the company. We are evolving toward a DAO-like model where decision-making and profit-sharing are distributed fairly and transparently.

Our Global Team
You'll work alongside an experienced, international team from Germany, USA, Kenya, India, and Canada. We value autonomy, clear communication, and shared responsibility.

To Apply as Business Development & Cofounder (SaaS Focus)
Apply if this sounds like you:

• You're comfortable reaching out to small and medium-sized digital companies.
• You're comfortable working remotely and part-time.

Please read the full job ad and consider the remuneration that is being offered for this role before applying.

Job Title: Head of AI Innovation and Development

Location: South Africa – Remote

Reports to: Managing Director

Type: Full Time Contract Role

Package: OTE R1,220,000 pa

Role Summary - Head of AI Innovation and Development (Marketing Focused)

We are seeking a forward thinking, commercially astute
Head of AI Innovation and Development
to lead the integration of AI capabilities across our marketing services business. This role will be pivotal in shaping and delivering our AI vision, driving innovation in client campaigns, internal operations and service offerings. You will combine strategic insight, deep AI knowledge and hands on execution to future proof the business and deliver measurable impact for our clients.

Key Responsibilities

Strategic Leadership

• Define and own the business's AI innovation strategy, aligning it with commercial growth, client success and operational efficiency.
• Identify emerging AI trends, technologies and tools relevant to marketing and translate them into actionable roadmaps.
• Act as a thought leader internally and externally, helping position the business as a pioneer in AI led marketing innovation.

AI Driven Marketing Strategy

• Develop and deploy AI enhanced strategies across performance marketing, content creation, SEO, CRM and customer journey personalisation.
• Collaborate with strategy, creative, media and data teams to integrate AI into client solutions, from predictive analytics and conversational AI to generative content and intelligent automation.
• Support the development of new data products and AI powered services for clients.

AI Solution Development

• Lead the end to end design and delivery of AI powered tools, models and applications tailored to client and business needs.
• Translate marketing use cases into technical requirements and collaborate with internal and external developers, data scientists and product managers to bring solutions to life.
• Oversee the development and integration of solutions such as:
• Intelligent content generators and optimisation engines
• Predictive lead scoring and customer segmentation models
• AI powered dashboards, recommendation engines and campaign automation tools
• Conversational AI platforms, including chatbots and virtual assistants
• Ensure AI solutions are scalable, robust and aligned with ethical, legal and commercial standards.
• Maintain an active development pipeline and roadmap of AI prototypes, pilots and launches.

Innovation and Transformation

• Champion internal transformation through AI to enhance campaign optimisation, client reporting and operational efficiency.
• Build business cases for AI investments, tools, partnerships and platforms.
• Foster a test and learn culture to rapidly prototype and scale new ideas.

Client Engagement and Commercial Impact

• Partner with senior account leads and client stakeholders to co create AI strategies and deliver value driven innovation.
• Support pitches, proposals and presentations by showcasing the role of AI in solving business and marketing challenges.
• Track ROI and performance impact of AI initiatives for clients and the business.

Governance and Risk Management

• Ensure all AI use aligns with ethical standards, data protection regulations and IP considerations.
• Set internal guidelines for responsible AI usage, including transparency, human oversight and model bias mitigation.
• Oversee governance frameworks for AI experimentation, vendor management and third party APIs.

Team Leadership and Capability Building

• Lead and mentor a cross functional team of data scientists, AI specialists, strategists and technologists.
• Drive internal training and AI literacy programmes across departments to raise understanding and adoption.
• Cultivate a culture of experimentation, learning and agile innovation.

Required Skills and Experience

Essential

• Proven experience in a strategic leadership role related to AI, innovation or digital transformation within a marketing services business, consultancy or technology led organisation.
• Strong understanding of AI technologies including generative AI, machine learning, NLP, LLMs and automation platforms in a marketing context.
• Hands on experience in delivering AI solutions from ideation through development to deployment and evaluation.
• Ability to connect business problems with data and AI capabilities to design commercially viable products or tools.
• Excellent communication, stakeholder engagement and client presentation skills.
• Comfortable leading multidisciplinary teams and managing change across creative and technical environments.
• Familiarity with martech stacks, including CRM, CDP, CMS, DAM, marketing automation and analytics platforms.
• Experience working with platforms such as OpenAI, Google Cloud AI, AWS ML or Azure AI.
• Knowledge of data governance, AI regulation and responsible AI frameworks such as GDPR or the EU AI Act.
• A network of AI vendors, startups and ecosystem partners.

Why Join Us?

This is a high impact, high visibility role in an ambitious marketing services business that values innovation, creativity and strategic thinking. You will help redefine what marketing looks like in the age of AI, working with leading brands and brilliant teams, and shaping the future of the business itself.

Package

We offer a highly competitive package that reflects the seniority and strategic importance of this role. This includes:

• Base salary in line with market benchmarks – R70,000 - R80,000 per month, based upon experience (Up to R960,000 pa)
• Performance based bonus linked to business and innovation outcomes – R200,000 per annum performance bonus
• Flexible working arrangements including hybrid or remote working
• Generous holiday allowance and additional leave options – 15 Days Paid Holiday + 8 UK Bank Holidays, 23 Days in total
• Continuous learning and professional development budget
• Access to cutting edge AI tools, platforms and innovation labs

How to Apply

If you are interested in applying for this role then can you please complete the following online questionnaire -

Thereafter, any suitable candidates will be invited to interview for role.

If you don't hear from us within two weeks of completing our online questionnaire then unfortunately you haven't been successful in this instance, and we wish you the very best in your future job search.

Please note: Initially, this is a part-time contract position that could evolve into a full-time contract role for the right candidate.

Join us at Equals Five and be part of a team that values innovation, creativity, and excellence

Equal Five is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.

Please, no agencies.

• Exposure to the latest AI tools and frameworks (LangChain, Llama-Index, and Vector Databases).
• Opportunity to deploy real-world GenAI solutions that drive tangible business outcomes.
• Collaborative, forward-thinking environment where your input shapes strategy.
• Commitment to equity and inclusion African and Coloured candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

• Design, implement, and optimize Generative AI solutions and RAG frameworks.
• Develop scalable data pipelines, perform ETL, and design dimensional models for optimal data storage.
• Deploy, monitor, and optimize AI models for performance, scalability, and cost efficiency.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to align solutions with business goals.
• Communicate complex AI concepts clearly to non-technical stakeholders.
• Stay ahead of the curve by researching and experimenting with new AI architectures and techniques.

• Education: Bachelors Degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Machine Learning, or a related field (Masters/PhD preferred).
• Experience: 3+ years in AI/ML, with at least 12 years specialising in Generative AI.
• Technical Skills:
  
  • Proficiency in Python, SQL, Pandas, and NumPy.
  • Experience with deep learning frameworks (TensorFlow and PyTorch) and LLM tools (LangChain and Llama-Index).
  • Cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, and Azure) and containerization (Docker and Kubernetes).
  • Strong data engineering skills (ETL, pipeline design, and data modelling).
  • Knowledge of MLOps practices for model versioning, monitoring, and retraining.
• Soft Skills: Proactive, curious, collaborative, and strong communicator.
• Preferred Certifications: AWS ML Specialty, GCP ML Engineer, Azure AI Engineer, or similar.

About talent match africa (tma)

talent match africa
is on a mission to unlock Africa's potential by connecting exceptional talent with organizations that are shaping the future. We don't just match skills to roles - we match people to possibilities. With a strong network across industries and a people-first approach, we help companies thrive while empowering professionals to build meaningful careers.

About this role

As a
Machine Learning Engineer
, you'll go beyond writing code to solving real-world problems with data. This role is about designing intelligent systems that learn and improve, tackling complex challenges that demand both creativity and technical depth. You'll thrive in collaboration, bringing ideas to life alongside a dynamic team.

What You'll Do

• Design, build, and deploy machine learning models and algorithms
• Develop scalable data pipelines for model training and inference
• Optimize models for performance and efficiency
• Collaborate with data scientists to bring research into production
• Monitor and maintain ML models in live environments
• Implement A/B testing frameworks to validate models
• Work with large-scale datasets and distributed computing systems
• Maintain and enhance existing ML systems

What We're Looking For

Required

• 3+ years of experience in machine learning and software development
• Proficiency in Python, R, or Scala
• Hands-on experience with ML frameworks (TensorFlow, PyTorch, Scikit-learn)
• Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure)
• Strong understanding of statistics and mathematics
• Experience with version control and software engineering best practices

Preferred

• Exposure to MLOps tools and practices
• Knowledge of containerization (Docker, Kubernetes)
• Experience building real-time inference systems

Why tma?

At
talent match africa
, you're not just taking on a job, you're joining a movement. You'll work with innovative teams, get exposure to impactful projects, and be part of an ecosystem that's redefining how Africa connects to opportunities.

The role of the Specialist Machine Learning Engineer encompasses many activities, including (but not limited to):

• Focusing on niche areas of machine learning, such as natural language processing, computer vision, or reinforcement learning.
• Developing domain-specific ML models tailored to specialized business needs.
• Conducting in-depth research and prototyping innovative solutions using advanced ML techniques.
• Identifying opportunities to apply cutting-edge machine learning advancements to improve processes or create new capabilities.
• Collaborating with other Engineers to transfer research findings into scalable, production-ready solutions.
• Providing expert insights on specific tools, frameworks, or algorithms, ensuring the organization stays ahead in ML innovation.
• Contributing to the development of internal ML tools and libraries to streamline workflows.

Minimum Qualification:

• NQF 6 or higher tertiary qualification in Information Communication Technology (ICT) field incorporating (but not limited to) Information Systems; Cloud certification.

Minimum Experience:

• Minimum of 6 years' experience in a field of a Machine Learning Engineer role.

This 12-month remote contract role places you on an international machine learning project through Dijkstrack for one of our global technology partners. You'll work within a distributed engineering team to design, train, and deploy ML models using modern frameworks like PyTorch. Dijkstrack engineers enjoy access to technical community support, structured delivery processes, and the opportunity to embed within long-term global product teams.

• Design, train, and deploy machine learning and deep learning models using PyTorch
• Build and maintain ML pipelines, model training workflows, and data processing components
• Work with product and engineering teams to integrate models into production systems
• Analyse datasets, performance metrics, and optimise models for accuracy and efficiency
• Implement MLOps best practices for model versioning, deployment, and monitoring
• Document models, datasets, evaluations, and maintain reproducibility standards
• Participate in code reviews and uphold engineering quality in ML codebases

• Strong proficiency in Python for ML development
• Hands-on experience with PyTorch (TensorFlow experience also welcome)
• Solid understanding of machine learning fundamentals, model architectures, training loops
• Ability to work with large datasets, ETL pipelines, and model optimisation
• Familiarity with Git workflows, remote collaboration, and agile delivery models

• Experience with ML Ops tools like MLflow, Weights & Biases, SageMaker, or similar
• Exposure to cloud-based ML deployments (AWS, Azure, GCP)
• Knowledge of microservice integration for ML models
• Prior work in AI product teams or international ML research environments

• Join a network of engineers delivering advanced ML solutions internationally
• Technical community of senior engineers across data, backend, and product domains
• Remote-first culture, global exposure, and structured technical delivery support