Software Development Manager Jobs in Pasadena, CA

Join us as a Software Development Manager in the AI Studios Engineering org within Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios, where you'll lead teams building intelligent systems at the intersection of AI and cinematic storytelling. This role offers an exciting opportunity to help build Nara, our AI-native content creation platform that empowers creators to produce professional animation and live action content featuring world-class intellectual properties at unprecedented speed and scale.
In this role, you'll lead teams responsible for building production-quality code for AI-powered creative tools while mentoring experienced engineers and scientists. You'll work alongside creative professionals (animators, filmmakers, and storytellers) delivering features that directly transform how animation and live action/VFX content is made for Prime Video's most ambitious productions. This is an ideal opportunity for leaders who are passionate about AI/ML applications in entertainment and want to grow their skills while contributing to industry-defining products featuring iconic IPs.
Key job responsibilities
- Lead and mentor engineering teams building production-quality software for our AI-native content creation platform, supporting professional animation and live action/VFX workflows
- Drive technical strategy and architecture decisions across the stack: backend services, media processing pipelines, APIs, ML model integrations, and creator-facing tooling, ensuring systems scale with production demands
- Establish and maintain high engineering standards through code review practices, testing strategies, and development processes that produce clean, reliable, and maintainable software
- Partner with cross-functional leaders including ML scientists, applied scientists, product managers, and creative professionals to translate ambiguous requirements into clear engineering roadmaps and deliverables
- Own integrations with industry-standard Digital Content Creation (DCC) tools such as Adobe Animate, After Effects, Maya, and Storyboard Pro, coordinating across teams to deliver seamless creator experiences
- Drive operational excellence for production systems, owning reliability, incident response, monitoring, and on-call processes while continuously raising the bar on system health
- Recruit, develop, and retain top engineering talent, fostering a culture of technical growth, constructive feedback, and ownership
- Stay current on AI/ML systems, media processing, and distributed computing trends, making build-vs-buy decisions and identifying opportunities to accelerate delivery through new technologies
A day in the life
As an SDM on the AI Studios team, you'll split your time between people leadership, technical strategy, and cross-functional collaboration. A typical day
might include reviewing architecture proposals for our creator tooling platform, unblocking your team on a complex live action VFX pipeline integration, or
partnering with ML scientists to prioritize model improvements based on creator feedback. What makes this role unique is the opportunity to work on-site alongside VFX artists and creative professionals, observing how your team's tools perform in real production workflows, identifying where creators
struggle, and directing engineering effort toward the highest-impact improvements. You'll run team standups, drive sprint planning, and facilitate retrospectives while maintaining enough technical depth to guide design decisions and evaluate tradeoffs. You'll coach engineers through increasingly
complex challenges, shape team roadmaps that balance innovation with operational excellence, and represent your team's work to senior leadership, all while building technology that powers content featuring world-class IPs.
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS
- 3+ years of engineering team management experience
- 7+ years of working directly within engineering teams experience
- 3+ years of designing or architecting (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
- 8+ years of leading the definition and development of multi tier web services experience
- Knowledge of engineering practices and patterns for the full software/hardware/networks development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, build processes, testing, certification, and livesite operations
- Experience partnering with product or program management teams
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
- Experience in communicating with users, other technical teams, and senior leadership to collect requirements, describe software product features, technical designs, and product strategy
- Experience in recruiting, hiring, mentoring/coaching and managing teams of Software Engineers to improve their skills, and make them more effective, product software engineers
Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.
Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company's reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.
Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you're applying in isn't listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.
The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.
USA, CA, Culver City - 184,900.00 - 250,200.00 USD annually
USA, NY, New York - 203,400.00 - 275,200.00 USD annually