Undergraduate and Graduate - Artificial Intelligence Specialty Intern

The Artificial Intelligence Project Intern joins a specialised cohort focused on building AI products and processes that improve the NBA's league and commercial operations. Working within a core project team managed by NBA AI and technology leaders, the intern supports the use of AI, including agentic solutions, across fan experience, basketball operations, player health and enterprise applications, with the goal of transforming workflows, improving efficiency and raising the quality of work. The role sits within the 10-week 2027 NBA Summer Internship, which runs from 7 June to 13 August 2027 and combines on-the-job project work with professional development, community and social programming.

• Identify areas where AI can improve business processes and enterprise applications across the organisation
• Develop and test AI-enabled prototypes that address operational needs across multiple business and basketball functions
• Support end-to-end development cycles, including problem definition, data acquisition, model creation, evaluation and stakeholder demo
• Translate business needs into AI/ML solution frameworks under guidance from AI and data governance leaders
• Work within a project team to maintain quality, alignment and responsible AI practices
• Evaluate and determine new AI use case implementation for current workflows or emerging initiatives
• Document methodologies, workflows and findings to ensure transferability and scale
• Contribute to projects within one of five priority areas confirmed each spring: enterprise applications (agentic and AI solutions redesigning workflows across league office functions such as Finance, Communications, Events, HR, Legal and IT)
• Basketball operations and research (visual outputs for basketball, media and fans, and analytics for officiating, scheduling and game operations)
• Player health (tools helping medical and performance staff support league-wide biomechanics and player-health data programmes)
• Fan experience (AI-powered personalisation, recommendations and assistants across NBA platforms)
• And data intelligence and platform analytics (data pipelines, retrieval and search over NBA data, and AI-assisted reporting and dashboards)

• Currently enrolled in a Bachelor's degree (rising seniors only) or a graduate-level degree in Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science, Data Science, Engineering, Information Systems, Statistics or a related field
• Relevant coursework, projects or experience with AI tools or machine learning techniques
• Strong academic standing
• Demonstrated leadership through extracurricular or community experience, consistent with NBA internship criteria
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain technical work to non-technical audiences
• Working knowledge of Python and SQL
• Has built at least one AI-powered app or automation through coursework, personal projects, research or hackathons
• Understands how large language models work, including their limits
• Familiar with APIs, Git and software testing, and able to explain and check code written with AI coding assistants
• Handles data and access securely
• Works well in a team and can manage several priorities at once
• Foundational mastery of AI technologies in driving project execution and achieving business objectives
• Strong interest and experience in technology, engineering, artificial intelligence, business consulting and data-driven problem solving

• Prior internship or hands-on project experience in technology or applied AI
• Building AI agents or multi-step workflows, including tool calling, MCP or reusable skills
• Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) and search over source material
• AI coding and development tools such as Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, Amazon Bedrock or Microsoft Copilot Studio
• Testing and measuring AI quality, such as accuracy, speed and cost
• Product design and building user interfaces for AI tools
• For basketball or player health projects: computer vision, 3D or game engines (e.g. Unreal Engine) or sensor data

• Eligible employees have the option of working remotely one day per week

• Undergraduate: $32/hr
• Graduate: $40/hr

• Employees and/or eligible dependents may be eligible to participate in company-sponsored employee benefit programmes including medical, short-term disability, mental health coaching/therapy and sick time
• Not all positions are eligible for these benefits; eligibility may vary by role
• Interns are invited to participate in a broad array of professional development programming as well as community and social experiences