Lead Software Engineer
The Walt Disney Company
Job Posting Title:
Lead Software EngineerReq ID:
10125650Job Description:
Technology is at the heart of Disney’s past, present, and future. Disney Entertainment and ESPN Product & Technology is a global organization of engineers, product developers, designers, technologists, data scientists, and more – all working to build and advance the technological backbone for Disney’s media business globally.
The team marries technology with creativity to build world-class products, enhance storytelling, and drive velocity, innovation, and scalability for our businesses. We are Storytellers and Innovators. Creators and Builders. Entertainers and Engineers. We work with every part of The Walt Disney Company’s media portfolio to advance the technological foundation and consumer media touch points serving millions of people around the world.
Here are a few reasons why we think you’d love working here:
Building the future of Disney’s media: Our Technologists are designing and building the products and platforms that will power our media, advertising, and distribution businesses for years to come. Reach, Scale & Impact: More than ever, Disney’s technology and products serve as a signature doorway for fans' connections with the company’s brands and stories. Disney+. Hulu. ESPN. ABC. ABC News…and many more. These products and brands – and the unmatched stories, storytellers, and events they carry – matter to millions of people globally. Innovation: We develop and implement groundbreaking products and techniques that shape industry norms, and solve complex and distinctive technical problems.
Product Engineering
Product Engineering is a unified team responsible for the engineering of Disney Entertainment & ESPN digital and streaming products and platforms. This includes product engineering, media engineering, quality assurance, engineering behind personalization, commerce, lifecycle, and identity.
Job Summary:
Describe what the person will do in the role - how he/she will impact the organization.
Our team is seeking a Lead Software Engineer to help us deliver excellent streaming experiences for Hulu and Disney+ as a developer of our client player. Our team is responsible for playback across several devices including gaming consoles and set top boxes. You will have the opportunity to lead in the design and implementation of our cross-platform C/C++ and Rust player that runs Disney+ and Hulu on these devices.
We’re looking for an experienced C/C++ or Rust engineer who has video player and cross platform development experience. You should have a passion for coding and debugging hard problems, and an eagerness to help us deliver seamless video to our subscribers. As a lead engineer, you will get to own large features, lead the technical direction of our work, and mentor and provide technical expertise to other engineers. You will work closely with other technical teams in the application layer and backend video services to deliver features.
Responsibilities
Develop and maintain our Rust and C/C++ player that drives our streaming experience
Optimize our player to perform well for resource constrained platforms
Create and review architecture and designs for our team’s projects
Maintain a strong understanding of our code to identify, research and address issues, collaborate with application development teams, services engineering teams and product management to help understand and explain device limitations and requirements
Lead in strategies to ensure the quality and stability of our deployments, including testing strategies and telemetry approaches
Develop our project’s build system and continuous integration system as needed
Provide technical expertise or mentoring to developers on our team, hold our team accountable to high development standards
Basic Qualifications
Minimum of 7 years of related work experience
Bachelors degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field or equivalent experience
Long record of full software development lifecycle experience
Fluent in C and C++ or Rust
Willing to learn Rust
Experience developing and optimizing multi-threaded applications
Experience using build runners / compilation tools for multi-platform projects
Strong individual contributor with a drive to learn and patience to teach others
Great communication and collaboration skills and a strong teamwork ethic
Preferred Qualifications
Rust
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Experience in Streaming technologies, including:
HLS (preferred) or DASH
DRM technologies like Playready or Widevine
Adaptive Bitrate Streaming Algorithms
Caption and subtitle formats such as CEA-608 / 708
Codecs AVC, HEVC, AAC, EAC3
Cross-Platform Development
Embedded operating system experience
Experience developing for gaming consoles (e.g. Playstation, Switch), Android devices (e.g.FireTV), or similar devices
Familiarity with set-top box development and specialized SoCs from manufacturers like Broadcom, MediaTek, etc.
Job Posting Segment:
Media EngineeringJob Posting Primary Business:
ME - Media Player EngineeringPrimary Job Posting Category:
Software EngineerEmployment Type:
Full timePrimary City, State, Region, Postal Code:
San Francisco, CA, USAAlternate City, State, Region, Postal Code:
USA - CA - 1200 Grand Central Ave, USA - NC - 3005 Carrington Mill Blvd, USA - NY - 7 Hudson SquareDate Posted:
2025-07-11