Senior Software Engineer - Data Foundation Platforms

The Walt Disney Company • Santa Monica, CA

14d

About The Position

We're looking for a Senior Software Engineer to join our Data Foundation Platform team. We build and provide cloud platform and services that are used by data engineering teams and data scientists across Disney Entertainment and ESPN Technology , particularly in processing data related to our streaming and web-based businesses (e.g., data from Disney+, Hulu, ESPN, etc.). The successful candidate will have a passion for technology and solid coding skills. Knowledge of specific technologies may be helpful but is less important than an ability to learn quickly. We value team members who aren't afraid to dive deep when required, think for themselves, and have great communication and teamwork skills. We’re seeking a skilled Back-End Software Engineer to help design and build secure, scalable, and high-performance systems that power Disney’s technology ecosystem. As part of a collaborative engineering team, you’ll contribute to building core backend services that support critical infrastructure and applications used across Disney’s diverse portfolio—including Disney+, Hulu, ESPN, and more. You’ll work on systems that require thoughtful design, robust implementation, and close integration with internal platforms and services. This is a great opportunity to be part of foundational engineering work that supports millions of users and enables secure, reliable, and automated operations across a wide range of environments. The ideal candidate is a strong backend engineer with excellent problem-solving skills, a drive to learn, and a passion for building well-engineered solutions. While familiarity with specific technologies is a plus, curiosity, adaptability, and a desire to work in a collaborative, fast-paced environment are even more important.

Requirements

• BS/BA in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, Information Technology, or a closely related field
• 5+ years software engineering experience in developing large projects
• Strong algorithmic problem-solving expertise and fundamental programming skills
• Proficient in Data Engineering technologies like Airflow, Spark, Databricks, Snowflake, OpenSearch, Neptune.
• Hands-on experience with modern architectural paradigms such as microservices, event-driven systems, and containerization (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes)
• Solid understanding of software design patterns and system design principles, with the ability to both apply best practices and critically assess them when needed
• Proficiency with cloud platforms such as AWS, GCP, or Azure, with a preference for AWS experience
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively across technical and non-technical teams

Nice To Haves

• Passion to explore new technologies and participate in proof of concepts.
• Demonstrated curiosity and enthusiasm for exploring new technologies through hands-on experimentation or proof-of-concept projects
• Strong interest in tackling complex, fast-evolving technology or business challenges
• Experience designing and building internet-scale platforms or systems with high availability and performance requirements
• Contributions to open-source projects or a portfolio of personal work (e.g., GitHub) that reflects your technical interests and abilities
• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in Computer Science or related discipline or its equivalent

Responsibilities

• Contribute to maintaining, updating, and expanding existing Data platform projects written in Spark, Python, and Scala
• Design, and code shared libraries that abstract complex business logic to allow consistent functionality across all data pipelines in the Data organization.
• Build and evolve secure systems across cloud and on-prem environments, integrating with a wide variety of external systems
• Build and maintain functionality across a range of areas — backend services, front-end UI, APIs, and command-line tools
• Drive operational excellence through observability, alerting, and reliability practices
• Be an active participant and advocate of agile/scrum ceremonies to collaborate and improve processes for our team.
• Engage with and understand our customers, forming relationships that allow us to understand and prioritize both innovative new offerings and incremental platform improvements.
• Maintain detailed documentation of your work and changes to support data quality and data governance requirements.

Benefits

• 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.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Number of Employees: 5,001-10,000 employees