Kai Jun Neo

Product Manager, Competitive Intelligence @ Traveloka | Ex-TikTok (ByteDance) Recommender Systems Software Engineer | AI & Data Products

Singapore, Singapore

About

Hi there! I have a strong background in building efficient, scalable, and intelligent systems to solve real-world business challenges. I’m currently exploring opportunities in Product Management, where I can combine my technical expertise with my passion for working with and helping people. Throughout my career, I’ve gained valuable client-facing and consultative experience, and I’m excited to apply that in a more solution-oriented, user-focused role. I thrive at the intersection of technology and communication — whether it’s translating complex systems into business value, working with stakeholders to understand their needs, or designing tailored solutions that deliver measurable impact. I also enjoy tackling inefficiencies, optimizing processes, and finding the best path forward. I hold a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science with Distinction from NUS and have worked across startups, big tech, and the public sector. Notably, my tenure at TikTok Recommendation team has endowed me with a profound comprehension of the cutting-edge technologies and sophisticated algorithms that power one of the world's most renowned recommender systems on a global scale. If any of this resonates with you, or if you simply wish to engage in a casual chat, please feel free to reach out to me! I am always keen to connect with like-minded professionals and explore potential opportunities for collaboration. Project Domain Experiences: Computer Security, Machine Learning, Computer Vision, Natural Language Processing, Sentiment Analysis, Reinforcement Learning, Data Science, Business Analytics, Generative AI, Expert Systems, Robotic Process Automation, Recommender Systems

Experience

  • Product Manager - Competitive Intelligence at Traveloka
    Jun 2025 - Present · 1 yr 2 mos

  • Software Engineer at TikTok
    Aug 2021 - Aug 2023 · 2 yrs 1 mo

    TikTok Recommendation System, Predict service owner – a core component responsible for feature engineering, model inferencing, and video scoring to recommend videos on “For You” feed • Executed code and feature integration between TikTok's recommendation systems and the newly acquired Musical.ly, cutting manpower and maintenance cost by 50% • Proposed and implemented a series of optimization projects, achieving total >35% CPU reduction, >32% MEM reduction, >236k logical cores savings and >$500,000 annual cloud expense savings globally across different DCs • Spearheaded platformization initiatives to synchronize >2600 TikTok’s features across various business domains (e-commerce, live, game etc.), achieving feature consistency and ~80% reduction in execution time for feature-related workflows • Managed the approval of >600 feature additions and removals from the recommendation system, following a rigorous review protocol to safeguard engineering and recommendation stability prior to model training • Deployed embedding vector caching in model inferencing module, resulting in ~15% less load and ~16% less bandwidth when querying the parameter server • Enhanced TikTok’s model integration with Musical.ly by establishing robust monitoring for feature coverage and distribution, significantly improving feature management efficiency • Participated in routine on-call duties, troubleshooting live site issues and executing timely disaster recovery measures, achieving an average of >99% SLA uptime at >400k QPS for TikTok’s recommendation system • Conducted A/B, stress and canary testing to ensure optimality in user engagement and system stability metrics following each update; integrated CI diff tools and proposed platform improvement strategies to streamline engineering processes • Executed targeted CPU and memory profiling to pinpoint resource bottlenecks and built Grafana dashboards for real-time stability monitoring

  • Software Engineer at ByteDance
    Aug 2021 - Aug 2023 · 2 yrs 1 mo

    TikTok Content Ecosystem Recommendation - owner of content-related recommendation architectures, such as 1) Music Video – recommend trending videos with the same music 2) Music Selection - recommend trending music for videos during editing 3) Effects / Filters - recommend trending effects/filters to be applied onto videos 4) Explore Tab - recommend multiple trending videos in one scroll-able page • Revamped the Music Video recommendation system to leverage an advanced framework, minimizing architectural complexity and improving overall stability, resulting in a video accuracy rate exceeding >99.5% • Administered many aspects of the Music Video recommendation deployment Ops, encompassing compilation, containerization, resource allocation, global cloud deployment, A/B testing, CI/CD, stability monitoring, troubleshooting, disaster recovery, and documentation • Enhanced creator-side A/B testing module driven by the cutting-edge Counterfactual framework; incorporated fail-safe mechanisms and comprehensive logging features for increased reliability • Set up disaster recovery strategies, automated alarms and pre-experiment CI verification, collectively achieving SLA uptime of >99.9% • Segregated video scoring module and config files within the Explore Tab recommendation system, effectively reducing coupling and increasing degree of modular independence • Optimized an internal recommendation framework by building a debugging and filtering tool used during video ranking and video recall stage respectively, cutting down average CPU utilization by 13% and latency by 10% • Spearheaded the transformation of >70 static downstream clients into dynamic clients and formulated a comprehensive SOP template for the creation of new downstream services, improving runtime adaptability and efficiency • Developed an integrated monitoring system for downstream services of TikTok recommendation, facilitating efficient stability tracking tailored to each downstream classification

  • National University of Singapore (1 yr 8 mos)
    • Tutor (Software Engineering, CS2103T)
      Aug 2020 - Dec 2020 · 5 mos

      • Taught theory and practical Software Engineering concepts in weekly tutorials to CS students • Evaluated and graded the deliverables as well as module project of CS students

    • Senior Adviser (Software Development - Orbital, CP2106)
      May 2019 - Dec 2020 · 1 yr 8 mos

      • Qualified as advisor in May 2019. Promoted to senior advisor in May 2020. Awarded the Best advisor award in August 2020 • Assessed and evaluated multiple software applications built by students • Provided constructive technical and non-technical feedback, and offered advice for improvement • Acted as primary communication channel between module coordinator and students

  • Software Engineer at U-Reg
    Jun 2020 - Aug 2020 · 3 mos

    • Fin-tech startup providing regulatory workflow platform for document exchange on automated repository • Designed, built and deployed company’s website with server from scratch • Built a backend data-mining app with fully functional interface and database • Implemented web scraping of text and files from multiple URL sources • Migrated database to PostgreSQL virtualized in Linux Docker container • Wrote RESTful APIs and documentation with emphasis on future maintainability