From studying Engineering at NUS to leading DS projects in Micron
I was a PhD candidate at NUS Industrial & Systems Engineering department from 2012 to 2016. After completion of my PhD thesis, I joined Micron MSB in September 2016 and work as a senior data science engineer. I chose this role with Micron because I always enjoyed working with data and advanced algorithms, and I was eager to learn and experience how the industry uses data science to solve problems and bring value. In Oct 2017, I became a senior data scientist in MCT (Manufacturing Central Team) big data team in Micron, which later became Smart Manufacturing & AI team.
I develop data science solutions to help improve equipment efficiency
Currently I am a senior data scientist lead, supporting multiple data science projects related to equipment efficiency. For example, one of the project I lead is about shifting left the anomaly detection from downstream inspection step to the process step itself, such that quality impact can be reduced and yield can be improved. And I am also leading the exploratory work on the predictive maintenance studies, which aims at using multivariate tool sensory data to predict the remaining useful life of the equipment. Besides, I am also the technical coach for junior data scientists in various projects, will provide coaching and technical advice while working with them in project meetings.
Participating in exciting projects with brilliant colleagues
In Micron, we form end-to-end project teams to work on innovative and challenging projects. In a typical data science project, the end-to-end team consists of project lead, subject matter experts, key end users, I4.0 analyst, solution architects, data scientists, data engineers, machine learning engineers, UX engineers, IT engineers etc. Team will meet up regularly to review the progress of tasks, share latest information about the project, share new knowledge we have learned, as well as brainstorm innovative ways to solve challenging problems. Hence, no matter what role I am playing in the end-to-end team, I would be able to learn from other colleagues and improve along the way.
Be open, positive, and embrace the growth mindset
The most important thing I have learned in my career by far, is to be open-minded and have a growth mindset. When I first started as a data science engineer, I was obsessed with the idea that I need to be working on those fancy ideas that allows me to apply the cutting-edge data science technologies, and I would be demotivated when assigned to other tasks like data engineering. Gradually, I found that actually all my experiences, no matter how big or small, will make me unique and become useful at some point in time. For example, if I did not have hands-on experiences on the data engineering tasks in the beginning, I would not be able to lead my team and give them good guidance. So my top advice is to be open, positive, and embrace the growth mindset!
I grew from new hire to data science technical lead
