Director of Artificial Intelligence
2 days ago
Farmingdale
About TYR Sport TYR Sport is one of the most recognized and respected performance athletic brands in the world. Named for the Norse god of valor and sacrifice, TYR was founded on the belief that the pursuit of excellence demands the finest tools. Today, TYR is the second-largest performance swimwear brand in North America, with products distributed in more than 30 countries and annual revenue exceeding $100 million. The brand’s portfolio spans competitive swimwear, triathlon gear, training apparel, footwear, and equipment — all engineered for athletes who train with intent and compete with purpose. TYR’s digital infrastructure is anchored by a Shopify Plus ecommerce platform supported by an expanding suite of technology integrations, including product information management tools and digital marketing platforms. As TYR accelerates its global digital business, the company is making a major investment in artificial intelligence to build a next-generation customer experience that unifies ecommerce, marketing, and sales into a single intelligent ecosystem. The Opportunity This is TYR’s most senior AI role. The Director of Artificial Intelligence will lead the company’s AI strategy, own the technical roadmap, and be accountable for AI’s impact on revenue, growth, and competitive advantage. Reporting directly to the Chief Operating Officer or Chief Executive Officer, this leader will build TYR’s AI function from the ground up, initially as a hands-on individual contributor. The Director will define the strategy, infrastructure, and operating framework that will shape the company’s technological future. As the function matures, there will be an opportunity to build and lead a dedicated AI team. The Director will operate as a peer to other functional leaders, with the authority to drive AI adoption across the organization, including ecommerce, marketing, sales, supply chain, and operations. The primary commercial focus of this role is TYR’s digital business. Ecommerce and marketing are the highest-priority domains, and the Director will be expected to deliver measurable results in these areas first. This leader will transform TYR’s digital storefront into a personalized, AI-driven shopping experience and help evolve marketing into a precision, data-driven growth engine. The ideal candidate is a seasoned AI practitioner who can operate strategically while remaining deeply hands-on — someone who has built and deployed high-impact AI products in ecommerce, retail, or consumer environments and can confidently influence senior leadership. Core Responsibilities Enterprise AI Leadership Serve as the single point of leadership for artificial intelligence across TYR. Define the company’s AI vision, establish strategic priorities, and oversee architectural and investment decisions. Develop and maintain a multi-year AI roadmap aligned with TYR’s growth strategy, and communicate progress and outcomes to executive leadership. Establish the processes, governance frameworks, and technical foundations necessary to scale AI innovation across the organization. Ecommerce Intelligence and Personalization Lead the transformation of TYR’s digital storefront into a personalized and intelligent shopping experience. Develop and deploy recommendation engines that surface the right products to the right customers across the digital journey, including homepage, product pages, cart, and post-purchase interactions. Build AI-driven search and product discovery tools that improve findability and reduce friction in the purchasing process. Design dynamic pricing and promotion models that optimize both margin and conversion, leveraging behavioral signals, purchase history, and inventory data. Develop a unified customer intelligence platform that enables TYR to understand, predict, and influence customer behavior across the full lifecycle. These capabilities should drive improvements in conversion rates, average order value, customer retention, and lifetime value. Marketing Intelligence and Growth Automation Partner closely with TYR’s marketing leadership to elevate the effectiveness and precision of marketing efforts through AI. Develop advanced customer segmentation models that move beyond demographic targeting to incorporate behavioral and predictive signals. These models will power more intelligent audience strategies across paid media, email, SMS, and social channels. Implement generative AI solutions that support dynamic content creation, including personalized ad copy, email messaging, and product descriptions. Establish automated testing and optimization frameworks to continuously improve campaign performance. Develop marketing mix and attribution models that enable real-time optimization of spend and improved return on ad investment. Build predictive models that support customer acquisition, retention, and churn prevention. Sales Enablement and B2B Intelligence Support TYR’s wholesale and B2B channels by developing AI-driven sales enablement tools. This includes predictive lead scoring, account health insights, and deal intelligence systems that help sales teams prioritize opportunities and strengthen relationships with key retail partners. Technical Execution and Partnerships Initially operate as a hands-on technical leader responsible for building and deploying AI solutions across TYR’s priority initiatives. Lead the full model lifecycle, including data ingestion, feature engineering, model development, deployment, and monitoring. Act as TYR’s primary liaison with AI technology vendors and platform partners to ensure the company leverages best-in-class tools and infrastructure. As the AI roadmap expands, the Director will help define and grow the supporting team. Responsible AI and Data Governance Establish and maintain TYR’s framework for responsible AI and data governance. Ensure that models and data systems adhere to principles of fairness, transparency, and privacy while complying with relevant regulations including GDPR and CCPA. Monitor production systems to mitigate bias, protect data security, and maintain high standards for model performance and accountability. Qualifications and Experience • 10+ years of experience in data science, machine learning, or a related field with a strong record as a hands-on practitioner, • Proven experience deploying AI solutions in ecommerce, retail, or direct-to-consumer environments with measurable business impact, • Ability to operate at an executive level and communicate complex technical concepts clearly to senior leadership, • Strong understanding of ecommerce or consumer business models and the ability to connect AI initiatives directly to business outcomes, • Deep technical expertise in machine learning, data science, and AI systems architecture, • Demonstrated ability to influence cross-functional stakeholders and drive adoption of AI across an organization, • Experience leading or building technical teams is a plus, • Master’s or Ph.D. in Computer Science, Statistics, Engineering, or a related quantitative field preferred; MBA a plus