M-KOPA is a fast-growing FinTech company offering millions of underbanked customers across Africa access to life-enhancing products and services. From our roots as the pioneer in pay-as-you-go “PayGo’” solar energy for off grid homes, we have grown into one of the most advanced connected asset financing platforms in the world, empowering a broad range of customers to achieve progress in their lives.
We are recruiting to fill the position below:
Job Title: Data Scientist - Credit Eligibility
Location: Lagos
Description
- We're looking for a Data Scientist who loves building predictive models and solving ambiguous data problems.
- You'll own the models that shape loan eligibility and pricing across 5 African markets.
- This is a small team with big responsibility, where your work directly shapes lending strategy for millions of customers.
The Impact
- Your models will directly shape how millions of underserved customers access credit for the first time.
- We've already helped over 7 million customers access over $2 billion in credit - and we process over 1.5 million payments daily. It's your chance to be part of something that's literally transforming lives across an entire continent.
The Opportunity
- Mission-driven data science: Build credit scoring and pricing models that expand financial access for customers traditionally excluded from formal lending
- Global recognition: Join a company named by TIME 100 as one of the world's most influential and by the Financial Times as Africa's fastest-growing for 4 consecutive years (2022–2025)
- Scale challenges: Work with rich repayment datasets across 5 African markets, developing ML models that balance growth with credit risk at scale
- Environmental impact: We're carbon-negative, having displaced over 2.1 million tonnes of emissions.
What You'll Do
- At M-KOPA, you'll build and refine the predictive models that power our lending strategy.
- You'll sit within a small, high-performing team with end-to-end ownership of credit scoring, loan eligibility, and pricing optimisation — working cross-functionally with engineers, analysts, growth managers, and commercial stakeholders across multiple countries.
- Join us in combining cutting-edge data science with purpose-driven work that makes digital and financial inclusion possible across Africa.
Day to day, you'll be:
- Building and refining credit scoring models that assess customer creditworthiness, default risk, and loan pricing across multiple markets
- Developing and testing ML models for loan eligibility and pricing optimisation through A/B testing and statistical analysis
- Continuously improving eligibility criteria by analysing repayment data, engineering new features, and monitoring credit performance for risk shifts and margin impact
- Collaborating cross-functionally with engineers, data scientists, and commercial stakeholders to scale models into production.
Technical Environment:
- Languages & Libraries: Python, SQL, scikit-learn, pandas, numpy, and relevant ML libraries
- Techniques: Predictive modelling, classification/regression, feature engineering, model selection, hyperparameter tuning, A/B testing
- Domain: Credit scoring, underwriting, loan pricing, risk analytics.
Our Team Approach:
- Low-ego environment where diversity, innovation, and collaboration drive both commercial growth and social impact
- High degree of ownership over your domain — you're empowered to make data-driven decisions and prioritise solutions
- Cross-functional collaboration with engineering, product, and commercial teams across multiple countries
- Analytical rigour combined with deep market understanding to serve customers excluded from formal financial services
What You Need
- Credit accessibility and affordability are at the core of this role.
- You'll join a small, high-performing team where every day brings new modelling challenges and analyses that shape our lending strategy.
- If building models that can transform financial access for millions of African customers excites you, we'd love to hear from you.
Required Experience:
- Experience building predictive models, particularly credit scoring, risk models, or similar classification/regression problems
- ML background with hands-on experience in model development, validation, deployment, and performance monitoring
- Proficiency in Python, SQL, and relevant ML libraries (scikit-learn, pandas, numpy, etc.) with experience in feature engineering, model selection, and hyperparameter tuning
- Experience translating complex model outputs into actionable business strategies and stakeholder communications
- Ability to work cross-functionally with product, engineering, and commercial teams
- Strong data communication skills — written, oral, and visual.
Highly Desirable:
- Experience in credit, underwriting, lending analytics, or fintech modelling.
Application Closing Date
Not Specified.
https://www.hotnigerianjobs.com/hotjobs/884640/data-scientist-credit-eligibility-at-mkopa-nigeria.html