MSc in Artificial Intelligence at Imperial (UK). What are my chances of landing a quant research role?

[InvestingScientist]

So have a place lined up at Imperial for their MSc in A.I. next year following a strong STEM degree. I have several IB internships to my name but wanting to move into the quant space. Am I doomed without a PhD?

 

[Daniel Duffy]

Is it possible to go from BA to Phd and 'skipping' MSc? Are you good in 'researching' on your own?

 

[InvestingScientist]

Is it possible to go from BA to Phd and 'skipping' MSc? Are you good in 'researching' on your own?

Certain universities offer an 'integrated Phd' wherebye you do a masters degree then a Phd. A Phd has been something I have considered but I am a more mature student and is less feasible for me.

Individual research I have undertaken in my BSc I performed well on as well as in those in the workplace, albeit this research has not been hugely mathematical.

 

[Daniel Duffy]

I see AI (and is very fuzzy and it's very early days IMHO) as an application area based on more fundamentals skill such as (numerical) mathematics, statistics and certain areas of computer science. Once you know these then I reckon life becomes easier.

It is not necessary to have a PhD to do research, but the circumstances need to be right. Here are two theses that probably fit into that category (having a good advisor does no harm):

https://www.datasim.nl/blogs/26/msc-theses-on-machine-learning-and-computational-finance

Will AI still be AI in 5, 10 years time as far as skills are concerned? Knowing how to use Python libraries is sufficient?

 

[InvestingScientist]

For me it is about learning the underyling mathematical and statistical frameworks, rather than just knowing how to implement through libraries. Imperial does offer a some modules in computational finance in addition to optimisation which I thought would be useful.

Thanks for the link. It provided some good insight!

I think the core computing skills behind AI will be the same in the next 10 years, however the underlying frameworks and theory will likely go through significant development. So naturally, skillsets will change

 

[Daniel Duffy]

I think the core computing skills behind AI will be the same in the next 10 years, however the underlying frameworks and theory will likely go through significant development. So naturally, skillsets will change

Time will tell. A new, disruptive technology could change that.