Benefits of FAANG companies for Data Science & Machine learning roles

I receive several messages about the benefits of joining FAANG and similar companies and startups in the context of Data Science, Machine Learning & AI roles.

Here’s my take, in no particular order:

1. 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝. FAANG+ are not only the top technology companies but also the biggest companies by market cap -> great brand to add to your profile, top compensation and benefits.
​
2. 𝐒𝐜𝐨𝐩𝐞. The scope of AI/ML applications in these companies is tremendous as they have tons of data. You can get to work on multiple use cases, driven by statistics, machine learning, deep learning, unsupervised / semi-supervised / self-supervised, reinforcement learning etc. Internal team transfers facilitate expanding your breadth of ML experience.

3. 𝐁𝐚𝐫. The AI/ML work is cutting edge, as most of these companies invest heavily in R&D and create game-changing techniques and models. They also invest heavily in platform, cloud, services etc. that make it easier to build and deploy ML products.

4. 𝐑&𝐃. You can do both research on moon-shot projects if that’s your cup of tea, as well as more immediate business-driven data science projects with monthly or quarterly deliverables.

5. 𝐏𝐞𝐨𝐩𝐥𝐞. You get to work with the creme-de-al-creme in terms of talent, ideas, vision, and execution. Your own level will rise if you are surrounded by some of the brightest folks, and also get to collaborate with their clients and collaborators from academia, startups as well.

6. 𝐍𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤. After FAANG, people go on to do many diverse things — from building a startup to doing cutting-edge research to non-profits to venture capital amongst others. You can find quality partners for the next steps of your career journey.

7. 𝐒𝐲𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐬. Processes and systems for AI/ML/Data are more mature and streamlined than smaller/newer companies which can facilitate your speed and execution of your projects.

8. 𝐂𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞. The culture, on average, is more professional as these companies invest heavily in their employees and regularly come up with new employee-friendly policies to make it a great place to work.

9. 𝐅𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐨𝐦. After FAANG, you will be in demand and recruiters and hiring managers will seek you out if you’ve proved your chops whilst at the company. You will have more opportunities to sample from and greater freedom in terms of deciding your career and life trajectory, as you can also move internally to different countries.

10. 𝐈𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐭. Given the scale at which these companies operate, the scope for real-world measurable impact is enormous.

There are some downsides, caveats and exceptions as well, but on average these factors make FAANG and similar tech companies a very attractive proposition to launch, build and grow your career in data science and machine learning.