Intern, Digital Ship NLP (8 Months)

Seaspan’s Innovation team is actively developing several technology areas including digital twins, green technologies, and autonomy in support of use cases for future vessels, engineering services, and in-service support.   Our innovation program includes current and planned projects seeking scalable solutions that integrate emerging technologies using real-time sensors, 3D spatial information, and visualization technologies to improve Seaspan’s shipbuilding and refit business. Seaspan has developed and integrated digital twin solutions in a scalable platform that integrates with sensors, communication systems, 3D models and visualization technologies all to minimize the service interruption of maintenance/refit and maximize vessel availability. Incremental development will be carried out as part of the Digital Ship Technical Development Roadmap Plan as new requirements and additional data are acquired.

The successful applicant for this internship will work within the Innovation team at Vancouver Shipyards and have exposure to the various areas of R&D Innovation, Vessel New Construction and In-Service Support at one of the largest shipbuilding companies in Canada. In this role, you will provide day-to-day support to Engineers while assisting and coordinating specific data science and natural language processing (NLP) related activities.

A results-oriented contributor and creative problem-solver, the candidate has a strong bias for detail, team collaboration and implementing systems that are innovative, fit-for-purpose, and promote user adoption and strategic outcomes.

What you'll do

• Develop, test, and maintain data pipelines for NLP workflows: Collaborate closely with the data team to build and optimize data pipelines that support natural language processing tasks, including text ingestion, preprocessing, annotation, and storage. Ensure efficient and scalable handling of unstructured text data from maintenance and operational documents throughout the project lifecycle.
• Feature engineering and model support: Design, test, and implement workflows to extract and engineer features from structured and unstructured data. Use Python and relevant machine learning libraries to support downstream tasks like classification, clustering, or information extraction.
• Information extraction from maintenance and operational documents: Apply natural language processing (NLP) techniques to extract structured insights from technical documentation such as maintenance logs, operational reports, and manuals. This includes experimenting with and contributing to the development or use of lightweight large language models (LLMs) to improve the accuracy and efficiency of the extraction process.
• Reporting, documentation, and insights presentation: Prepare comprehensive reports and visualizations to clearly communicate data-driven insights, model performance, and project outcomes to technical and non-technical audiences. Assist in creating presentations and maintaining proper documentation for stakeholders, ensuring transparency and clarity in project deliverables, and aligning findings with business objectives.

What you'll bring 

• Enrollment in a third or later year of Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a closely related degree.
• Demonstrated experience using Python along with libraries commonly used in data and text processing, such as Pandas, SpaCy, NLTK, Hugging Face Transformers, and Scikit-learn.
• Familiarity with applying natural language processing methods for tasks such as information extraction, document classification, and text summarization. Exposure to working with large language models (e.g., fine-tuning, prompt engineering, or evaluation) is a strong plus.
• Demonstrated technical knowledge and engineering skills through exposure to multiple class projects or co-op terms.
• Above average analytical skills and ability to learn quickly to gather, analyze, and synthesize data.
• String working knowledge of Microsoft products including Excel/Word/PowerPoint.
• Experience with SQL, and other database management tools.
• Effective communication, interpersonal and organization skills.
• Strong problem-solving skills, analytical abilities and interpersonal skills that support business-oriented solution development.
• Ability to exercise sound judgment and decision-making skills consistent with the essential job functions.
• Innate curiosity and enthusiasm for exploring and developing modern technologies and processes.

Why you'll love working here

• This is an internship, a temporary position with opportunities to work in our dynamic and forward-looking Innovation department for up to 8 months .
• Parking is included and to assist those using transit, we operate a complimentary shuttle bus Monday through Friday with various pick-up and drop-off points around North Vancouver.
• Seaspan is committed to Employment Equity, supports diversity in the workplace, and encourages applications from all qualified individuals including, women, members of visible minorities, Indigenous persons, and persons with disabilities.

We require a full-time commitment Monday-Friday, 40 hours per week with an hourly rate of $26.00/hour.

Start Date of Internship: Monday, September 8th, 2025. 

End Date of Internship: Friday, May 1st, 2026 (8-Months).

Please submit your Resume, Cover Letter and Academic Transcript as one PDF document. 

Application Closing Date: Sunday, June 22nd, 2025 at 11:59pm PST. 

Please note: if we receive a large volume of applications, we may close this posting ahead of the closing date, therefore, we recommend applying early. Only those applicants under consideration will be contacted.

To learn more about our InternSHIP Program, visit our website: www.seaspan.com/internships-at-seaspan/ 

#LI-ONSITE

Seaspan Shipyards is one of North America’s most modern shipyards and unique in its ability to provide a complete range of services including new construction, conversion, refit, repair and life-cycle maintenance work for Canada’s Coast Guard and Navy as well as commercial vessels including cruise-ships and deep-sea vessels. Seaspan Shipyards operations include Vancouver Shipyards, Vancouver Drydock and Victoria Shipyards.  

To learn more, visit our website: www.seaspan.com  

This position may involve defense articles and/or technical data regulated by the U.S. International Traffic in Arms Regulations (“ITAR”) and the U.S. Arms Export Control Act. In compliance with ITAR, the successful candidate will be subject to a security clearance through the Canadian Controlled Goods Program as regulated by the Controlled Goods Regulations and Defense Production Act. The successful candidate will be required to maintain their security clearance throughout their employment in this position.

Seaspan is committed to Employment Equity, supports diversity in the workplace, and encourages applications from all qualified individuals including, women, members of visible minorities, Indigenous persons, and persons with disabilities. If you require any accommodations at any stage of the recruitment process, please reach out to our Talent Acquisition team at recruit@seaspan.com for confidential support. We are committed to providing an inclusive and accessible environment.