Senior Machine Learning Engineer – Ad Platforms

Job Summary:

Disney Entertainment & ESPN Technology

On any given day at Disney Entertainment & ESPN Technology, we’re reimagining ways to create magical viewing experiences for the world’s most beloved stories while also transforming Disney’s media business for the future. Whether that’s evolving our streaming and digital products in new and immersive ways, powering worldwide advertising and distribution to maximize flexibility and efficiency, or delivering Disney’s unmatched entertainment and sports content, every day is a moment to make a difference to partners and to hundreds of millions of people around the world.

A few reasons why we think you’d love working for Disney Entertainment & ESPN Technology

• Building the future of Disney’s media business: DE&E Technologists are designing and building the infrastructure that will power Disney’s media, advertising, and distribution businesses for years to come.
• Reach & Scale: The products and platforms this group builds and operates delight millions of consumers every minute of every day – from Disney+ and Hulu, to ABC News and Entertainment, to ESPN and ESPN+, and much more.
• Innovation: We develop and execute groundbreaking products and techniques that shape industry norms and enhance how audiences experience sports, entertainment & news.

Ad Platforms organization within Disney Entertainment and ESPN Technology is fully responsible for building, enhancing and maintaining the high-performance, distributed, microservice-based Advertising Platform across all of Disney online properties, including Hulu and ESPN+. We build and maintain proprietary technology, ranging from ad serving, ad targeting, ad delivery, campaign management, reporting as well as all the integrations internal and external that come with evolving and maintaining a best-in-class video advertising business.

The Ad Platform research team is under Ad Platforms and its mission is to transform advertising and Disney’s Ad platform with AI and data science. We build solutions to measure and optimize every aspect of the advertising life cycle. Our tenant is a strong cross-domain team to deliver E2E solutions for machine learning and data science. Our team is seeking a principal machine learning engineer who will be an outstanding addition and leading development for prediction or optimization engines for addressable ad platforms. The right person for this role should be experienced in crafting implementation for either machine learning technologies or data-driven algorithms. If you are someone who is proactive, inquisitive, and innovative in these domains, this is a phenomenal role for you!

WHAT YOU’LL DO

• Drive ground-breaking innovation and apply state of the art AI and machine learning in a variety of areas to enhance every aspect of advertising, including inventory forecasting, ad experience, ad pacing, pricing, targeting, and efficient ad delivery.
• Invent and iterate novel solutions for complex ad challenges with fast turnaround.
• Lead the ad algorithm architecture design and iteration of the advertising system.
• Develop scalable and efficient approaches for large scale data analysis and model development. 
• Build and experiment new algorithms and models end-to-end, from production rollout to continuous optimization.
• Collaborate with engineering teams, product managers, and program managers in an open and creative environment.
• Mentor junior team members and support their technical growth. 

WHAT TO BRING

• Bachelor’s in computer science or equivalent experience
• At least 5 years of working experience on large scale machine learning at leading internet companies. Experience in the advertising domain is preferred.  Experience with forecasting algorithm is preferred.
• Strong knowledge of AI/ML technologies, mathematics and statistics.
• Proficient in Java, Python, Scala, large scale ML/DL platforms and processing tech stack.
• Passionate about understanding the ad business, applying advanced research to relevant business scenarios, and seeking innovation opportunities to enhance business effectiveness.
• Passionate about technology, open to interdisciplinary collaborations, and experienced in building data-driven services and applications.
• A proven track record of thriving in a fast-paced, data-driven, and collaborative work environment is required.

NICE-TO-HAVES

• MS or PhD(preferred) in computer science or equivalent experience
• Experience in digital video advertising or digital marketing domain
• Experience with CTR/CVR model, generative AI, forecasting model.
• Experience with feature store, audience segmentation and MLOps
• Experience with Tensorflow, Kubeflow or Sagemaker

The hiring range for this position in Los Angeles, CA is $138,900 – $186,200 per year, in Seattle, WA is $145,400 – $195,000 per year, and in San Francisco, CA is $152,100 – $203,900. The base pay actually offered will take into account internal equity and also may vary depending on the candidate’s geographic region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience among other factors. A bonus and/or long-term incentive units may be provided as part of the compensation package, in addition to the full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the level and position offered.