Principal Software Engineer - Player Team

Job Description

Principal Engineer- Player Team, Bangalore
About Warner Bros. Discovery:
Warner Bros. Discovery, a premier global media and entertainment company, offers audiences the world's most differentiated and complete portfolio of content, brands and franchises across television, film, streaming and gaming. The new company combines Warner Media's premium entertainment, sports and news assets with Discovery's leading non-fiction and international entertainment and sports businesses.
For more information, please visit www.wbd.com.
Meet Our Team:
We are the Product Engineering group for Direct-2-Consumer business, and responsible for building OTT Player (HLS and DASH) for several Warner Bros Discovery products across 70+ different platforms. We build Player SDK for Android, Apple, Desktop, HWA and STB platforms to provide seamless integration experience to the WBD applications.

Roles & Responsibilities:
About the Role
We are looking for a Principal Engineer to lead the architecture, design, and development of the core player engine and SDKs powering our OTT streaming applications across various platforms (iOS, Android, Web, Roku, CTV, STBs, etc.). This is a critical technical leadership role driving performance, scalability, and quality of video playback across millions of devices.

Key Responsibilities
• Architect and develop core media playback engines and SDKs for video streaming applications.
• Drive end-to-end design of low-latency, high-performance video playback pipelines, including adaptive bitrate streaming (ABR), DRM, buffering, caching, and analytics.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (Product, Video Platform, QA, CDN, Content Ops) to define requirements and translate them into scalable technical solutions.
• Ensure high-quality playback experience across various network conditions and device capabilities.
• Define and enforce coding standards, performance benchmarks, and SDK versioning strategies.
• Mentor junior engineers and contribute to technical roadmaps, design reviews, and code quality initiatives.
• Investigate and resolve complex issues related to playback failures, latency, memory usage, and system stability.
• Monitor industry trends in streaming protocols (HLS, DASH), media formats, and hardware acceleration APIs (MediaCodec, AVFoundation, etc.) to keep our technology stack modern.

Required Skills & Qualifications
• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• 16+ years of experience in software engineering with 10+ years of hands-on development in media playback engines or OTT video streaming SDKs.
• Expertise in video streaming protocols: HLS, MPEG-DASH, CMAF, RTMP, etc.
• Strong proficiency in C/C++, JavaScript, Swift, Kotlin, React Native, Bright Script.
• Deep understanding of DRM technologies (Widevine, FairPlay, PlayReady).
• Experience with media frameworks: ExoPlayer, AVPlayer, Shaka Player, or custom engines.
• Experience with live streaming (low latency, DVR)
• Familiarity with CDNs, video encoding pipelines, and ABR algorithms.
• Proven experience with multi-platform development (mobile, web, smart TVs, gaming consoles).
• Understanding of CI/CD, A/B testing, and observability in production environments.
• Excellent problem-solving, debugging, and performance tuning skills.
• Strong communication and leadership skills; ability to influence and drive cross-team decisions.
Nice to Have
• Exposure to WebAssembly, Rust, or cross-platform player architectures.
• Contributions to open-source media player projects or streaming SDKs.

Characteristics & Traits
• Naturally inquisitive, critical thinker, proactive problem-solver, and detail-oriented.
• Positive attitude and an open mind
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to act independently and responsibly
• Self-starter, comfortable initiating projects from design to execution with minimal supervision
• Ability to manage and balance multiple (and sometimes competing) priorities in a fast-paced, complex business environment and can manage time effectively to consistently meet deadlines
• Team player and relationship builder
What We Offer:
• A Great Place to work.
• Equal opportunity employer
• Fast track growth opportunities

Championing Inclusion at WBD
Warner Bros. Discovery embraces the opportunity to build a workforce that reflects a wide array of perspectives, backgrounds and experiences. Being an equal opportunity employer means that we take seriously our responsibility to consider qualified candidates on the basis of merit, regardless of sex, gender identity, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, religion or belief, marital status, pregnancy, parenthood, disability or any other category protected by law.
If you're a qualified candidate with a disability and you require adjustments or accommodations during the job application and/or recruitment process, please visit our accessibility page for instructions to submit your request.

Jobcode: Reference SBJ-eooqk2-18-97-14-86-42 in your application.