Sr Product Software Engineer

The Walt Disney Company; Santa Monica (CA); On-site; USD 142,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

The Walt Disney Company is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to join the Payments team, part of Disney Entertainment and ESPN Product & Technology. You will own the stability and scalability of a multi-tenant payments platform servicing Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu, working across teams to evolve architecture and resilience.

Responsibilities include delivering high-throughput transaction processing, enhancing security and PCI controls, and mentoring engineers.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in CS or related field, or equivalent work experience.
• 5+ years of related work experience
• Hands-on experience with Scala or Java
• API design experience with REST and gRPC
• Strong analytical and system design skills
• Experience with event-driven systems (Kafka, RabbitMQ, AWS SNS/SQS)
• Exposure to cloud infrastructure (AWS, Kubernetes)
• Strong communicator and team player in dynamic environments
• Commitment to continuous learning and excellence

Responsibilities

• Own the stability, scalability, and reliability of the multi-tenant payment platform for Disney+ / ESPN+ / Hulu.
• Drive technical solutions from design through implementation and operation.
• Develop expertise in Global Payments and advocate best practices.
• Deliver at scale with high-throughput systems processing millions of transactions.
• Lead reliability improvements and integrate new payment processors.
• Champion security, PCI compliance, and data protection.
• Maintain code quality with tests, reviews, and clean design.
• Identify opportunities for automation and debt reduction.
• Support production systems via on-call rotations and incident response.

Skills

Scala

Java

REST API

gRPC

Kafka

RabbitMQ

AWS

Kubernetes

Communication

On-call

Education

Bachelor’s degree in CS or related field

Tools

Spinnaker

Job 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 execute groundbreaking products and techniques that shape industry norms and enhance how audiences experience sports, entertainment & news.

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.

Disney, a global leader in entertainment, is seeking a talented and dedicated Senior Software Engineer to join our Payments team. This is a unique opportunity to be part of a team within the Commerce, Growth and Identity organization that manages the payment transactions of millions of customers across our celebrated platforms - Disney+, ESPN+, Hulu.

What we’re looking for

We value engineers who demonstrate a strong sense of ownership, accountability, and initiative. Success in this role requires proactively identifying problems, driving solutions with minimal direction, collaborating effectively across teams, and taking responsibility for the long-term health and reliability of the systems you build and operate.

Role Location

This is an on-site role requiring 4 days in-person at designated office locations.

Responsibilities

• Own the stability, scalability, and reliability of our multi-tenant payment platform supporting Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu, proactivelyidentifyingand resolving issues before theyimpactcustomers.

• Demonstrate strong ownership by driving technical solutions from design through implementation and operation, collaborating across teams to evolve the architecture of Tier 1 payment services.

• Build deepexpertisein Global Payments, taking initiative to understand international payment ecosystems and solve the unique challenges of serving a global streaming audience.

• Deliver at scale by designing, building, and operating high-throughput systems that process millions of payment transactions whilemaintainingperformance, resilience, and operational excellence.

• Lead reliability and performance improvements for mission-critical payment services, including integrations with new payment processors and support for SCA and other regional payment requirements.

• Champion security best practices for payment data storage, tokenization, and PCI compliance, ensuring the platform meets the highest security standards.

• Maintain a high engineering bar by writing well-tested, maintainable code, activelyparticipatingin design discussions and code reviews, and continuously improving system quality.

• Take initiative toidentifyopportunities for innovation, operational improvements, automation, and technical debt reduction, helping shape the future of our payment platform.

• Operate with an ownership mindset, supporting critical production systems through on-call rotations, incident response, root cause analysis, and long-term corrective actions to improve service health.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Software, Electrical or Electronics Engineering, or comparable field of study, and/or equivalent work experience

• Minimum of 5 years of related work experience

• Proven hands‑on experience with Scala, Java, or similar programming languages.

• Proven hands‑on experience with API design, including REST andgRPC.

• Demonstrated analytical andstrong systemdesign skills.

• Hands‑on experience with event‑driven systems using technologies such as Kafka, RabbitMQ, or AWS SNS/SQS.

• Exposure to cloud infrastructure, such as AWS, Spinnaker, and Kubernetes

• Strong communicator and team player, able to adapt quicklyandeffectively in dynamic, fast-pacedenvironments.

• A commitment to continuous learning, mentorship, and striving for excellence.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience working in functional programming environments, especially with Scala and the Cats Effect ecosystem

• Experience managing Tier 1 production services, including participation in on‑call rotations and incident response.

• Experience mentoring interns and junior engineers

#DISNEYTECH

The hiring range for this position in New York, NY is $148,700 to $199,400 and in Los Angeles, CA is $141,900 to $190,300 per year. 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.

Job ID: 10149909

Location: Santa Monica,California

Job Posting Company: Disney Entertainment and ESPN Product & Technology

The Walt Disney Company and its Affiliated Companies are Equal Employment Opportunity employers and welcome all job seekers including individuals with disabilities and veterans with disabilities. If you have a disability and believe you need a reasonable accommodation in order to search for a job opening or apply for a position, email [e-mail] with your request. This email address is not for general employment inquiries or correspondence. We will only respond to those requests that are related to the accessibility of the online application system due to a disability.