Join us in bringing joy to customer experience. Five9 is a leading provider of cloud contact center software, bringing the power of cloud innovation to customers worldwide.

Living our values everyday results in our team-first culture and enables us to innovate, grow, and thrive while enjoying the journey together. We celebrate diversity and foster an inclusive environment, empowering our employees to be their authentic selves.

As Vice President of Data Science, you will lead and grow our in-house data science team. This team is responsible for research, experimentation, data collection and curation, and data analysis that contributes to the performance of Five9’s AI products. Tasks include evaluation of and selection of AI agent architectural frameworks, evaluation and comparison of LLM models across commercial and open source choices, model fine-tuning for dedicated tasks, prompt engineering, prompt structure and design, and composite model definitions and evaluations. The scale of Five9 provides a wealth of data that data science team has access to. The data science team is very much applied – their work directly makes its way into real products providing direct customer benefit.

As lead of this team, you will take complete ownership of the technical and operational direction of the organization, including growing to team to meet increased demand for its capabilities.

Key Responsibilities:

Technical Direction Setting: As an expert in the leading edge of AI and data science, you will direct the team on the methodologies, practices, algorithms, experiments and processes they perform.
Hands On: You are expected to also be hands on, not just a manger, and be directly responsible for some amount of the technical work in addition to directing the team.
Organizational Growth: You will be tasked with growing the team, and ensuring we have the right talent to accomplish our goals.
Collaborator and Spokesperson: You will act as an internal and external spokesperson for data science, and collaborate with stakeholders across the company. Internally, you will be expected to meet with product managers, executives and estaff, and be able to converse effectively with them. You will also occasionally meet with customers to understand how Five9 products, and the data science behind them, impacts the customers. You are expected to participate in industry activities, including publication of blog posts and papers, along with participation in AI conferences.

Technical Expertise:

12+ years experience in data science or AI applied research, ideally at a best-in-class applied research organization.

Deep Expertise in Modern AI/ML

Extensive hands-on experience with LLMs, agentic architectures, retrieval-augmented systems, transformers, and composite model pipelines.
Strong understanding of commercial and open-source model ecosystems (e.g., OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Mistral), including evaluation, benchmarking, and tradeoff analysis.

Model Development & Optimization

Proven ability to perform fine-tuning, supervised/unsupervised training, prompt engineering, prompt optimization, and model orchestration for real-world use cases.
Experience designing evaluation frameworks, experiment methodologies, and robust model comparison workflows.

Data Engineering & Curation

Expertise in large-scale data collection, labeling, cleaning, and curation pipelines, preferably with conversational or unstructured text data.
Familiarity with tools and techniques for data quality assessment, dataset versioning, and data governance.

Applied Data Science & Analytics

Strong proficiency in statistical analysis, A/B experimentation, causal inference, and performance measurement.
Demonstrated success turning data insights into product improvements that drive measurable business outcomes.

Software Development & Systems Thinking

Ability to work with engineering teams using modern software practices (Python, data platforms, cloud-native environments, APIs, ML Ops tooling).
Understanding of production ML systems, deployment patterns, monitoring, and safety/guardrail design.

People & Collaboration Skills:

Cross-Functional Partnering

Ability to collaborate effectively with product managers, engineering leaders, UX, and GTM teams to translate business needs into data science strategies.
Adept at explaining complex technical concepts to executives, customers, and non-technical stakeholders.

Communication & Storytelling

Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, including ability to publish thought leadership (papers, blog posts) and present at conferences.

Team Development & Mentorship

Passion for mentoring senior and junior data scientists, fostering technical excellence, and building a culture of experimentation and rigorous thinking.

Customer Empathy

Experience engaging directly with customers to understand their needs, gather feedback, and translate insights into product or model improvements.

Leadership & Strategic Skills:

Vision Setting & Direction

Ability to define the data science strategy for AI Agents and customer experience products, aligning with corporate priorities and market opportunities.

Hands-On Leadership

Comfortable being an active contributor—writing code, running experiments, reviewing research—while simultaneously guiding the team’s overall direction.

Organizational Scaling

Experience hiring, scaling, and structuring high-performing data science teams across multiple geographies.

Operational Excellence

Ability to build processes for experimentation, model evaluation, data quality management, and continuous delivery of data science innovation into product.

Executive Presence & Influence

Skilled at influencing E-staff and senior leadership, defending technical decisions, shaping product strategy, and representing data science internally and externally.

Ethics, Safety & Risk Awareness

Deep understanding of responsible AI principles, privacy considerations, and model safety, including evaluating risks when operating at enterprise scale.

Educational Requirements:

Advanced degree in a quantitative or technical field, such as:

Ph.D. in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Electrical Engineering, Computational Linguistics, or a related field.
Master’s degree in one of the above fields with significant applied industry experience in AI/ML leadership roles.

Work Location: This role is fully remote for candidates who reside outside the 30 mile radius of one of our offices. For candidates who reside within a 30 mile radius of one of our offices, this role is Hybrid and would require 3 days a week (T, W, TH) in office.

As part of our continued commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, Five9 supports pay transparency during the entire recruitment process. Actual compensation packages are based on several factors that are unique to each candidate including, but not limited to: skill set, depth of experience, certifications, and specific work location. The range displayed reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the job across the United States. Your recruiter can share more about the specific compensation package during your hiring process.

Additionally, the total compensation package for this position may also include an annual performance bonus, stock, and/or other applicable incentive compensation plans.

Our total reward package also includes:

Health, dental, and vision coverage, beginning on the first day of employment. Five9 covers 100% of the employee portion of the health, dental and vision coverage and shares a high portion of the dependent cost. We also offer Short & Long-Term Disability, Basic Life Insurance, and a 401k saving plan with employer matching.
Access to an innovative mental health support platform that offers personalized care and resources in areas such as: therapy, coaching and self-guided mindfulness exercises for all covered employees and their covered dependents.
Generous employee stock purchase plan.
Paid Time Off, Company paid holidays, paid volunteer hours and 12 weeks paid parental leave.

All compensation and benefits are subject to the requirements and restrictions set forth in the applicable plan documents and any written agreements between the parties.

The US base salary range for this role is below.

$233,000—$512,000 USD

Five9 embraces diversity and is committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills.  The more inclusive we are, the better we are.  Five9 is an equal opportunity employer.

Five9 is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities throughout the application and interview process. If you need assistance or an accommodation due to a disability, please contact us at [email protected] to request an accommodation. Requests will be handled confidentially and in accordance with applicable law.

View our privacy policy, including our privacy notice to California residents here: https://www.five9.com/pt-pt/legal.

Note: Five9 will never request that an applicant send money as a prerequisite for commencing employment with Five9.

The US base salary range for this role is below. 233000 - 512000 USD

About the company

Cloud-based contact center software helps businesses manage customer interactions with tools for inbound and outbound calls, including call routing, predictive dialing, IVR self-service, and analytics. The platform is accessed via a web-based suite delivered as a subscription, scalable and globally deployable with strong security. It differentiates itself with a broad feature set in the cloud, enterprise-grade security, and training via Five9 University. The goal is to help organizations improve customer service operations and efficiency by handling all interactions across channels.

Company Size

1,001-5,000

Company Stage

IPO

Headquarters

San Ramon, California

Founded

2001

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Simplify's Take

What believers are saying

Q2 2026 revenue rose 10% to $312.4 million, with subscription growth accelerating.
AI revenue jumped 78% in Q2 2026, and management lifted full-year AI guidance.
Five9 closed a roughly $100 million Google Marketplace customer win and joined S&P SmallCap 600.

What critics are saying

Five9 securities litigation survived dismissal February 23, 2026 and enters discovery.
Regal and OpenMethods integrations show partners can capture Five9 customers without replacing telephony.
Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Google Marketplace can commoditize Five9’s interface, shrinking pricing power by 2027.

What makes Five9 unique

Five9 Fusion links Salesforce, ServiceNow, Epic, and third-party voice AI through one platform.
Voice AI Agents launched June 23, 2026, adding agentic self-service and warm handoffs.
Five9 serves 3,500 enterprises across 140+ countries, with 107% subscription retention.

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Benefits

Health Insurance
Dental Insurance
Vision Insurance
Life Insurance
Disability Insurance
401(k) Retirement Plan
401(k) Company Match
Mental Health Support
Paid Vacation
Paid Sick Leave
Parental Leave
Employee Stock Purchase Plan

Growth & Insights and Company News

Headcount

6 month growth

1 year growth

2 year growth

TechRseries

Oct 13th, 2026

Cisne joins Five9 ISV Partner ecosystem to deliver next-generation workforce orchestration.

Cisne joins Five9 ISV Partner ecosystem to deliver next-generation workforce orchestration. Pre-built marketplace integration synchronizes live contact center queue data with dynamic capacity modeling across distributed teams and automated workflows. Cisne, an AI-native workforce management and operational orchestration platform, today announced its formal integration with Five9 (NASDAQ: FIVN), provider of the Intelligent CX Platform. As an Accredited Five9 ISV Partner available on the Five9 CX Marketplace, Cisne equips enterprise customer care operations with a continuous operational framework designed to replace static interval forecasting with real-time capacity alignment. The rapid adoption of autonomous AI voice agents and conversational self-service, like that available in the Five9 Intelligent CX Platform, has fundamentally rewritten contact center operational math. Inbound voice is no longer a simple, direct queue to human seats: voice AI agents now answer live calls, authenticate callers, resolve multi-step transactions, and hand off mid-call escalations to human specialists. Because automation filters out the straightforward inquiries, human agents are left with high-friction edge cases that drive up handle-time variance, while fluctuating voice containment rates make live call arrival patterns erratic. Cisne establishes an active data pipeline with the Five9 platform, ingesting live interaction and queue data to continuously calibrate staffing requirements against actual floor conditions. Key Operational Capabilities - Non-Linear Capacity Modeling: Continuously recalculates staffing requirements by modeling variable bot containment rates alongside escalating average handle times (AHT) on escalations. - Algorithmic Intraday Rebalancing: Monitors queue health continuously, recommending schedule adjustments and dynamic skill reassignments the moment live volume diverges from baseline forecasts. - BPO & Partner Roster Alignment: Consolidates third-party outsourced labor, distributed remote staff, and automated workflows into a unified roster view, eliminating disconnected planning silos. - Frictionless Administrative Workflows: Provides automated schedule optimization and direct mobile access for shift trades and adjustments, significantly lowering non-productive supervisory overhead. "Traditional workforce management assumes that tomorrow will look enough like yesterday to plan it in fixed intervals," said Natalie Perez, CEO of Cisne AI. "That assumption breaks down when customer interactions move between AI and human agents. An interaction may be resolved by AI in ninety seconds, escalated to a person halfway through, or require both at different points. Cisne was built to show operations leaders how that mix is changing while they can still act on it. Through our Five9 integration, they can adjust capacity before a shift in demand becomes a missed service level." "Five9 gives contact centers an open, AI-powered platform where voice agents and human specialists work the same queue, and Cisne brings the real-time workforce orchestration that keeps staffing aligned with how that work actually moves," said Meg Higgins, SVP Business Development, Five9. "That combination is especially powerful as AI reshapes call volume in real time, where Cisne's capacity modeling helps operations leaders spot staffing gaps before they become missed service levels, rebalance schedules as conditions change, and keep both AI and human capacity ready for whatever the queue sends next." [To share your insights with us, please write to [email protected]]

Associated Press

Oct 12th, 2026

Cisne joins Five9 marketplace with real-time AI workforce orchestration for contact centres

Cisne, an AI-native workforce management platform, has joined the Five9 CX Marketplace as an accredited independent software vendor partner. The integration is available globally. It pulls live queue and interaction data from Five9's Intelligent CX Platform to adjust staffing as conditions change. Cisne says traditional interval forecasting breaks down as AI voice agents handle simple calls and pass harder cases to human staff. The tool models variable bot containment rates and longer handle times on escalated calls. It recommends schedule changes when live volume departs from forecasts, and it combines outsourced, remote, and automated labour in one roster view. "Traditional workforce management assumes that tomorrow will look enough like yesterday to plan it in fixed intervals," said Natalie Perez, chief executive officer of Cisne AI. Cisne is based in Coral Springs, Florida.

PR Newswire

Oct 7th, 2026

NovelVox achieves Five9 Select ISV Partner status to accelerate CX transformation in banking, credit unions, and healthcare.

NovelVox achieves Five9 Select ISV Partner status to accelerate CX transformation in banking, credit unions, and healthcare. Oct 07, 2026, 09:00 ET Industry-ready integrations with Jack Henry, Fiserv, FIS, Corelation KeyStone, Oracle Health, and other core platforms help Five9 customers connect agent and AI-powered customer experiences with critical systems of record ROSWELL, Ga., Oct. 7, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - NovelVox, the execution layer for AI and unified agent experiences in regulated industries, today announced that it has achieved Select ISV Partner status with Five9 (NASDAQ: FIVN), provider of the Intelligent CX Platform. The elevated designation builds on NovelVox's existing Accreditation as a Five9 ISV partner and establishes a formal reseller relationship between the two companies, enabling a direct offer of NovelVox's Agent Accelerator solutions for banking, credit unions, and healthcare verticals, along with its Contact Center Integration Platform (CCIP), to joint customers. The milestone gives Five9 customers a streamlined, validated path to connect the Five9 Intelligent CX Platform with the core systems and workflows that power their industry operations. For Five9 customers, NovelVox brings ready integrations with platforms, including Jack Henry, Fiserv, FIS, Corelation KeyStone, and Oracle Health. These integrations make it easier to connect the contact center with systems of record and accelerate the deployment of industry-specific customer service, sales, and self-service workflows. For agents, NovelVox Agent Accelerator connects the Five9 experience directly into core systems of record, bringing customer, member, patient, and interaction context into a single view. Instead of switching between multiple applications to find information or complete routine actions, agents can execute workflows directly from a single view, improving productivity and creating more seamless customer interactions. NovelVox CCIP extends that same connectivity beyond the agent desktop into IVR, AI, and self-service experiences. Rather than simply answering questions, organizations can enable governed actions such as retrieving information, validating customer details, supporting transactions, and completing service workflows. The result is greater continuity across the customer journey. When an interaction moves from self-service to a live agent, the captured context moves with it, so customers don't repeat themselves and agents start with a clearer picture of what's already happened. "The next phase of customer experience is not simply about adding AI to the contact center - it is about connecting both AI and human interactions with the systems where customer work actually gets done," said Amit Gandhi, CEO of NovelVox. "Together, Five9 and NovelVox can help banking, credit union, and healthcare organizations bring that execution layer into their customer journeys. With industry-ready integrations and unified workflows, organizations can move faster while delivering more connected experiences across both agents and self-service." "Five9 gives banking, credit union, and healthcare organizations an AI-powered platform built for the contact center, and NovelVox brings the industry-ready integrations that connect it to the core systems where customer work actually happens," said Meg Higgins, SVP of Business Development at Five9. "That combination is especially powerful for regulated industries, where NovelVox's integrations with core banking and healthcare systems help agents resolve requests faster, reduce compliance risk, and give customers a more connected experience across both live and self-service channels." About NovelVox NovelVox is the execution layer for AI and unified agent experiences, helping enterprises connect customer interactions with the systems, workflows, and actions required to complete them. With more than 17 years of experience, 250+ customers, and 1,000+ installations, NovelVox supports organizations across healthcare, financial services, insurance, automotive, and other workflow-intensive industries through solutions designed to improve agent productivity, enable governed AI execution, and deliver connected customer experiences. SOURCE NovelVox

Foreign Policy Journal

Sep 24th, 2026

SoundHound AI (NASDAQ: SOUN) pushes deeper into banking as competition from NICE and Five9 heats up.

SoundHound AI (NASDAQ: SOUN) pushes deeper into banking as competition from NICE and Five9 heats up. SoundHound AI (NASDAQ: SOUN) is building momentum in banking and financial services as enterprises seek to automate customer interactions without sacrificing service quality. In the second quarter of 2026, the company renewed or expanded contracts with two of the top seven global banking institutions and one of the largest global insurers. Management also cited growing demand from regional banks and credit unions looking to scale customer service operations and extend their operating hours beyond traditional limits. A top-tier regional credit union recently deployed SoundHound's automated AI agents while maintaining existing service standards and containment rates. Financial services represent a particularly meaningful opportunity because the sector demands stronger controls than most consumer-facing markets, requiring security, traceability and consistent oversight. SoundHound says its platform combines built-in guardrails with rigorous agent evaluation, positioning it as a viable option for mission-critical banking workflows where reliability is non-negotiable. The company's acquisition of LivePerson further reinforces this strategy, integrating enterprise digital messaging infrastructure to offer a unified platform spanning voice, web, mobile, SMS and social channels. The combined entity gains access to a customer base that includes 25 Fortune 100 companies, opening significant cross-selling opportunities across large enterprises in regulated industries. Second-quarter revenues rose 45% year over year to $61.9 million, though adjusted EBITDA remained a loss of $9.6 million, underscoring the profitability challenge that still faces the business. SoundHound's shares have declined 38.6% year to date, underperforming the broader industry, while the stock currently trades at a forward price-to-sales multiple of 10.32, slightly below the industry average. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for SoundHound's 2026 and 2027 loss per share has narrowed over the past 60 days to 18 cents and 13 cents respectively, though the 2026 figure remains wider than the prior year's loss of 13 cents per share. SoundHound faces direct competition from NICE Ltd. (NASDAQ: NICE), whose CXone platform combines AI-driven self-service, workflow automation and agent assistance tailored to banks, insurers and wealth-management firms. Five9 (NASDAQ: FIVN) similarly targets financial institutions with cloud-based contact-center solutions that emphasize controlled dialogue flows for highly regulated industries, helping enterprises maintain compliant customer communications. Five9's expanding Voice AI Agents platform supports complex, multi-step workflows, while both Five9 and NICE are well-positioned to intensify competitive pressure as SoundHound pursues deeper penetration in regulated markets. Sustained adoption across banking and financial services could meaningfully broaden SoundHound's enterprise revenue mix, but proof of secure, compliant deployment at scale will remain the critical test ahead. SOUN currently carries a Zacks Rank of 2, classified as a Buy rating.

Yahoo Finance

Sep 23rd, 2026

Five9 president sells $244K in shares under pre-arranged trading plan

Andy Dignan, President of Five9, sold 6,986 shares at $35.00 per share on 17 September 2026, totalling $244,510, according to an SEC filing. The sale was executed under a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan adopted over a year earlier in September 2025. Following the transaction, Dignan retains direct ownership of 237,614 shares, representing a 0.31% stake in the company valued at approximately $8.8 million. At the time of sale, Five9 had delivered a 33% one-year total return. Five9 provides cloud-based contact centre software with a market capitalisation of $2.6 billion and trailing-12-month revenue of $1.2 billion. The company's revenue grew 9% year over year, whilst operating margin improved to 4.7% from 2.5% the previous year.

Five9

Vice President - Data Science

About the job