# Scout roster review — 2026-08-18

Analysis only. No changes made to `COMPANIES`. Every claim below was verified by probing the
live endpoint; unverified candidates are listed separately as *probe-worthy*, not as recommendations.

Method: aggregated the scan-stats tables from the four most recent full runs (2026-07-14, 07-27,
08-07, 08-18), cross-referenced `state/decisions.json` (253 decisions), and live-probed candidate
ATS endpoints.

---

## 1. Three scrapers are silently broken

Same failure class as the dbt Labs 404 fixed earlier today, but worse: these return HTTP 200 and
plausible-looking rows, so the report shows "0 matches" and nothing looks wrong. **A company that
scrapes garbage is indistinguishable from a company with no openings.**

| Company | What it actually returns | Verified |
|---|---|---|
| **Roche** | Shanghai, Kyiv, Petaling Jaya, Bogota, Berlin, Mannheim, Penzberg. **Zero Swiss roles** despite Basel HQ — the `locationsearch=Switzerland` URL param is being ignored and an unfiltered default page is scraped. | live scrape, 10/10 rows non-CH |
| **Meta** | **1 row**: "Research Scientist Intern, AI/ML, Core Ads Growth (PhD)". Meta Zurich is a real engineering office. The `offices[0]=Zurich` filter or the lazy-load scroll is failing. | live scrape, 4 jobs across 4 runs |
| **Apple** | 21 rows, **all** internships, "Where we're hiring", and "US - Specialist: Seasonal, Part-time". Zero actual engineering reqs. | live scrape, all 21 rows |

**This invalidates a conclusion in the yield data.** Apple shows 21 decisions, all `skip`, 0 signal —
that reads as "Apple is a bad fit" but it is really "the scraper only ever saw the internships page."
Don't drop Apple on that evidence; fix the scrape first, then judge.

## 2. Seven boards have no title filter at all

`_title_filter` is absent on **BKW, SBB, BFH, PostFinance, Swissgrid, Novartis, Palantir**. This is
why reports drown in *Mitarbeiter/in Hausdienst*, *Financial Accountant*, *Studiengangsleiter Master
Physiotherapie*, *SAP Consultant Treasury*.

| Company | Eligible → match ≥2 (4 runs) | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| BKW | 61 / 75 scraped | 81% of the entire board "matches" |
| SBB | 27 / 27 | 100% — filter is doing nothing |
| BFH | 29 / 48 | 60% |
| Novartis | 105 eligible → 21 match | 23 skips vs 3 shortlists |

**These need a title filter, not removal.** BKW/SBB/BFH/PostFinance/Swissgrid are the Bern/Thun
WLB-exception tier where below-bar comp is deliberately accepted — the lane is intentional, the
noise is not. RUAG already carries a 29-term filter and behaves (13 eligible → 7 match); it is the
model to copy.

## 3. The yield metric in the decisions log is confounded

Raw decision counts reward boards with *no* title filter — more rows surfaced means more `skip`
rows recorded. Normalising to signal (`shortlist`+`applied`+`maybe`) per eligible role inverts the
ranking: **Snowflake** (5 decisions → 1 applied, 1 shortlist, 1 maybe off 14 eligible) is a far
better board than **Novartis** (31 decisions → 3 shortlists off 105 eligible). Worth keeping in
mind before reading the decisions log as a quality signal.

## 4. Dead lanes

- **MET Group + Louis Dreyfus: 1,464 roles scraped across 4 runs → 0 eligible, 0 matches. Ever.**
  Both are title-filtered correctly; they simply have no CH/remote-CH engineering roles. LDC is
  Geneva/Rotterdam-anchored (French). The commodity-trading lane is configured and producing nothing.
- **Norway (Telenor, Equinor, NATO JWC Stavanger)** — three of 34 companies on a lane your own notes
  call mostly closed: comp below the 180k bar, Norwegian at A2, no clearance. Equinor just came back
  rejected at 79 days. Consolidation candidate, though NATO JWC has an open application pending.

---

## 5. Verified adds — both confirmed live

### Amazon / AWS — the single biggest gap

`https://www.amazon.jobs/en/search.json?normalized_country_code[]=CHE` → clean public JSON, **32 CH roles**.
Among them, live right now:

- **Senior Forward Deployed Engineer, AWS Forward Deployed Engineering — Zurich**
- Sr. Delivery Consultant – AI/ML, Professional Services — Zurich
- Sr Specialist SA – GenAI, Specialists Team Germany/Switzerland — Zurich
- Senior Security Assurance Solutions Architect, AWS Security Assurance — Zurich

Why this matters more than any other candidate: **AWS is the primary cloud in the evidence base**
(SW-1 migration, the Swisscom data products). `claims.json:274` marks GCP `evidence: unverified,
output: forbidden` — which is exactly what hard-gated the two Google GenAI FDE reqs this morning.
An AWS-native FDE req in Zurich is the same lane without the cloud gap. Clears the comp bar.
No adapter work needed beyond a thin JSON fetcher.

### Axpo — the energy-trading lane, finally live

`https://careers.axpo.com/jobs.json` — Teamtailor on a custom domain. **400 roles, 98 tech-ish.**
Note the feed is JSON Feed format keyed `items`, not `jobs`, so the existing `fetch_teamtailor`
needs a small tweak (and the demo-board fingerprint guard still applies).

Live right now: **"Forward Deployed AI Engineer (f/m/d)"**, plus Senior Application Manager/Solution
Architect, Quantitative Modeller, Junior/Financial Data Analyst, Leiter/in IT Division Hydroenergie.

Memory (`user_role_targeting_energy_trading`) names Axpo and Alpiq explicitly as targets — data/
platform engineering *inside* a trading shop, not ETRM or quant. Only MET was ever configured, and
MET has produced nothing. Axpo is German-speaking (Baden/Zurich), which fits the DE/EN profile that
rules out the Geneva traders.

## 6. Verified negative — do not add

- **Coinbase proper.** Greenhouse board `coinbase` is live (169 jobs) but has exactly **2 EMEA-remote
  roles, both non-engineering** (Business Controller, Threat Assessment Manager). The Ventures board
  removed earlier was portfolio-only, so Coinbase was never really covered — but covering it properly
  gains nothing. Crypto lane stays Kraken + Bitcoin Suisse.
- **Alpiq, Glencore, Swiss Re, Sunrise** — no SmartRecruiters, Greenhouse, Ashby or Lever board found.
  Careers sites are bespoke/JS-rendered with no discoverable JSON API in a network trace. Not worth
  Playwright maintenance on spec.
- **The remote-EU data-infra tier as a category** (ClickHouse, MongoDB, Redis, Temporal, Airbyte,
  Starburst…). Skipping this deliberately: Grafana is already on the roster and memory flags it as
  **below-bar geo-fenced comp**. These firms band EU-remote salaries the same way, so the whole tier
  fails the 180k bar regardless of role fit. Elastic/Confluent/Grafana already cover the archetype.

## 7. Probe-worthy — not yet verified, do not add on my word

- **CERN** (`careers.cern/jobs`) — has dedicated "Data Science, AI & Analytics" and "Information
  Technologies" fields of work. English-working international organisation in CH, i.e. the same lane
  as the BIS Basel application. Needs a scrape-mechanics check. Best remaining unverified candidate.
- **Swiss Post** (`career.post.ch`) — Bern-headquartered, has an "Informatik und Digital Services"
  category, fits the Bern WLB tier alongside PostFinance (already scraped, and a Swiss Post company).
  My probe timed out on `networkidle`; needs a retry with a laxer wait.
- **NATO NCIA** (`ncia.nato.int/careers.html`) — the current `nato` adapter returns 4 reqs, all JWC
  Stavanger. NCIA is NATO's actual technology arm (Brussels/The Hague/Mons) and is a separate
  pipeline. Worth checking whether it is separately scrapable — it would be the one way to keep a
  NATO lane without the Norway constraints.
- **SIX Group** — fingerprinted as SuccessFactors (`career_company=sixgroupse`). Zurich financial-
  market infrastructure. Endpoint pattern is known; content unverified.

---

## Suggested order of work

1. **Fix Roche / Meta / Apple** — restores three companies that currently contribute nothing while
   appearing healthy. Highest value per unit effort, and it's a correctness bug, not a preference.
2. **Add Amazon/AWS** — trivial adapter, an on-profile Zurich FDE req live today.
3. **Add Axpo** — small `fetch_teamtailor` tweak for the `items` key; opens the energy lane.
4. **Add title filters** to BKW, SBB, BFH, PostFinance, Swissgrid, Novartis, Palantir.
5. **Decide on MET/LDC and the Norway three** — a judgment call, not a bug.
6. Probe CERN, Swiss Post, NATO NCIA, SIX.