Staff Software Engineer, Demand Bidder, Ad Serving Platform

Roku; New York (NY); On-site; USD 195,000 - 408,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Equity awards

Life insurance

Disability benefits

Parental leave

Wellness benefits

Paid time off

Job summary

Roku in New York is seeking a Senior Software Engineer (Staff scope) to scale and evolve our real-time ad serving platform. You will own end-to-end subsystems, drive architecture improvements, and mentor teammates in a high-throughput environment.

This role offers a competitive compensation package with health, equity, life and disability insurance, parental leave, and wellness benefits. Expect to work across engineering and data science to ship reliable, low-latency decisions.

Qualifications

• 10+ years designing, building and operating large-scale, low-latency distributed systems.
• End-to-end ownership of complex systems from design to production feedback.
• Experience ramping into large codebases quickly and delivering real impact.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and operate core components of a large-scale, real-time distributed decisioning system with strict latency requirements
• Take end-to-end ownership of subsystems: architecture, implementation, testing, deployment, on-call, evolution
• Develop mental model of a highly distributed production system and implement high-leverage improvements
• Identify opportunities to evolve the system and tooling
• Collaborate with engineers and applied scientists on distributed systems and ML-driven decisions
• Diagnose timing- or statistics-related issues in a concurrent, multi-region system
• Mentor engineers and raise engineering rigor, testing discipline, and operational excellence
• Communicate clearly with stakeholders and drive alignment across teams

Skills

Real-time distributed systems

End-to-end ownership

Java

Algorithms & data structures

Cloud (GCP/AWS)

ML-driven decision making

AI coding assistants in production

High ownership & initiative

Education

B.S. or M.S. in Computer Science or related field

Tools

GCP/AWS

Job description

Overview

Teamwork makes the stream work. Roku is changing how the world watches TV. Roku is the #1 TV streaming platform in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, and we aim to power every television in the world. Our mission is to be the TV streaming platform that connects the entire TV ecosystem, enabling consumers to access content, publishers to monetize audiences, and advertisers to engage consumers.

About the Team

Roku's Ad Serving Team builds and operates the real-time advertising platform that powers Roku’s ad monetization across video, display, and native formats. Within Ad Serving, the Demand Bidder team handles high-throughput, low-latency systems that serve relevant ads for tens of thousands of campaigns through targeting, scoring, bidding, auctions, measurement, and more. Every millisecond and decision drives revenue, and the team maintains strong engineering rigor.

About the Role

We are hiring a Senior Software Engineer (Staff scope) to scale and evolve this platform. Demand Bidder is a large, high-throughput system supporting growth as we onboard new businesses. We are scaling architecture, including a state-of-the-art pacing engine, scoring/ML engine, and modular design for agentic development. The reliability bar rises with business scale, and we seek someone who can rapidly master this ecosystem and own key initiatives.

For New York Only — The estimated annual salary for this position is between $195,000 – $408,000. Compensation packages are based on factors unique to each candidate, including skill set, certifications, and location. This role is eligible for health insurance, equity awards, life insurance, disability benefits, parental leave, wellness benefits, and paid time off.

How will I use AI at Roku?

At Roku, we don’t just use AI, we work with it. AI agents and smart tools help power drafts, analysis, and repetitive workflows, while people provide direction, judgment, and accountability. We’re looking for curious, adaptable builders who can show how they’ve used AI or automation to move faster and scale impact.

We value fluency across the agentic engineering toolchain — coding harnesses like Claude Code or Cursor, MCP servers, custom skills, or agent frameworks. You should be able to describe projects where you shipped real work with these tools, drive an agent, verify its output, and ramp on an unfamiliar codebase with agent assistance.

What You\'ll Be Doing

• Design, build, and operate core components of a large-scale, real-time distributed decisioning system with strict latency requirements
• Take end-to-end ownership of specific subsystems: architecture, implementation, testing, deployment, on-call, and long-term evolution
• Build a mental model of a highly distributed, complex production system and contribute high-leverage improvements
• Identify opportunities to continuously evolve the system and tooling
• Partner with engineers and applied scientists working at the intersection of distributed systems and statistical/ML-driven decision-making
• Diagnose and resolve subtle timing- or statistics-related issues in a highly concurrent, multi-region distributed system
• Mentor engineers and raise the bar on engineering rigor, testing discipline, and operational excellence
• Communicate clearly with technical and non-technical stakeholders and drive alignment across engineering, product, and business partners

We\'re Excited If You Have

• 10+ years of experience designing, building, and operating large-scale, low-latency distributed systems — ideally including at least one system built substantially from the ground up
• Track record of owning complex systems end-to-end: design, build, operate, on-call, and iterate based on production feedback
• Ability to ramp quickly into unfamiliar, large codebases and be productive fast
• Experience evolving and refactoring live, business-critical systems without compromising uptime or correctness
• Strong command of Java and fundamentals in algorithms, data structures, concurrency, and performance optimization
• Practical experience with distributed caching, high-throughput messaging/streaming systems, and SQL/NoSQL datastores
• Comfort operating in cloud infrastructure (GCP or AWS) at scale
• Exposure to statistical, control-theory, or ML-driven techniques in production decision-making is a plus
• Real-time bidding/ad-tech domain experience is a plus; experience in related high-stakes domains is valued
• B.S. or M.S. in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience
• High ownership, self-motivation, critical thinking, and comfort with ambiguity
• Collaborative, team-oriented mindset and openness to different approaches
• Experience using AI coding assistants in production work and opinions on their responsible use
• Curiosity about applying AI to monitor system health, triage issues, or develop agentic workflows

What are the Benefits?

Roku offers a diverse range of benefits as part of our compensation package, including mental health and financial wellness resources. Local benefits may include healthcare, life, disability, commuter, and retirement options. Benefits vary by location and role. For location-specific details, please consult with your recruiter.

Accommodations

Roku welcomes applicants of all backgrounds and provides reasonable accommodations. If you require accommodations at any point in the hiring process, please contact [e-mail].

Roku\'s Culture

Roku maintains a fast-paced environment focused on the company\'s success. We value collaboration, practical problem-solving, and a culture of action and trust. We have a long-standing culture of innovation and customer-focused delivery.

To learn more about Roku, our global footprint, and growth, visit https://www.weareroku.com/factsheet.

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