Umer Khalifa

Data scientist with 6+ years of experience building AI/ML systems, data pipelines, and analytics assets, including healthcare AI applications built on patient-level and clinical data structured using LOINC, SNOMED-CT, and RxNorm, and HL7-formatted (Synthea) synthetic EHR data. Skilled in SQL, cloud data platforms, data modeling and documentation, data quality and validation, and translating complex technical concepts for both technical and business stakeholders. PhD in Applied Statistical Modeling, with a research background in computational modeling, numerical analysis, and machine learning, and a recent publication applying LLMs to clinical trial screening.

Staff AI Engineer - Altimetrik (Citi Bank N.A) - Toronto, Ontario, Canada

(2024-10)

Designed and deployed production-grade AI systems using deep learning, NLP, and LLMs, with a focus on scalable inference, model evaluation, and optimization for enterprise data consumers.

• Built intelligent document analysis pipelines using Transformers, embeddings, and LLM-based architectures, achieving 90% accuracy in automated document processing — including structuring unstructured source documents into reusable, well-documented data assets.
• Ran model experimentation, benchmarking, and accuracy-performance analysis (A/B testing, prompt optimization), improving model effectiveness by 86% and establishing repeatable evaluation and validation practices.
• Built AI/data workflows using AWS SageMaker, Bedrock, OpenSearch Vector Database, Glue, and serverless infrastructure, partnering with business and technical stakeholders to translate requirements into data solutions.

Data Scientist I - Zerve AI - Toronto, Ontario, Canada

(2023-01 - 2024-10)

Developed and optimized deep learning and NLP models for AI-assisted developer tools, including retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) architectures over large, heterogeneous data sources.

• Optimized model pipelines using parameter-efficient fine-tuning (LoRA, PEFT) to improve training efficiency and reduce compute cost.
• Built production ML inference services (FastAPI, Docker, Kubernetes, KServe) supporting scalable, reliable delivery of data-driven features to downstream consumers.
• Developed forecasting and predictive models (ARIMA, SARIMA, Prophet) using statistical learning for large-scale production environments.

Data Science Consultant - Zerve AI - Chennai, India

(2022-06 - 2022-12)

Built data pipelines using GitHub datasets and PySpark to prepare, validate, and structure large-scale data for training and evaluation of machine learning models.

• Fine-tuned language models and evaluated performance through experimentation, benchmarking, and optimization; documented model behavior and limitations for downstream users.
• Designed ML deployment workflows using Docker, FastAPI, Jenkins CI/CD, and AWS services (SageMaker, S3).

Data Scientist - Procyon Technostructure - Chennai, India & California, USA

(2019-12 - 2022-06)

Improved deep learning architectures for healthcare AI applications, optimizing model performance, feature representations, and prediction accuracy on high-dimensional clinical data structured using LOINC, SNOMED-CT, and RxNorm coding standards.

• Developed neural network-based systems for patient identification using high-dimensional healthcare data, including data structuring and quality checks against clinical coding standards to support reliable matching.
• Implemented anomaly detection and ML pipelines for real-time healthcare intelligence, evaluating outputs through statistical analysis and experimentation.

Research Fellow - Sathyabama Institute of Science and Technology - Chennai, India

(2016-01 - 2019-01)

Developed computational models using machine learning and statistical methods to forecast environmental parameters, applying optimization, simulation, and predictive modeling to complex scientific datasets.

• Performed numerical analysis, statistical experimentation, and model evaluation (ARIMA, Exponential Smoothing, Monte Carlo Simulation, PCA, CCA, ANOVA) using Python and R.

Teacher - Ministry of Education, Maldives

(2014-06 - 2015-11)

PhD - Life Sciences (Applied Statistical Analysis Focus) - Sathyabama Institute of Science and Technology (2023)

M.Sc.

• Marine Studies & Coastal Resource Management - Madras Christian College (University of Madras) (2014)

B.Sc.

• Advanced Zoology and Biotechnology - The New College (University of Madras) (2012)