Senior Software Development Engineer - Advertising Technology

Expedia Group brands power global travel for everyone, everywhere. We design cutting-edge tech to make travel smoother and more memorable, and we create groundbreaking solutions for our partners. Our diverse, vibrant, and welcoming community is essential in driving our success.

Why Join Us?

To shape the future of travel, people must come first. Guided by our Values and Leadership Agreements, we foster an open culture where everyone belongs, differences are celebrated and know that when one of us wins, we all win.

We provide a full benefits package, including exciting travel perks, generous time-off, parental leave, a flexible work model (with some pretty cool offices), and career development resources, all to fuel our employees' passion for travel and ensure a rewarding career journey. We’re building a more open world. Join us.

Introduction to the team
Expedia Group Advertising builds the platforms and experiences that connect advertisers with millions of travelers worldwide. Our mission is to help partners reach the right traveler with the right message at the right time through intuitive advertiser experiences, high‑performance ad delivery systems, and intelligent, AI‑powered optimization.

We are looking for a Senior Software Development Engineer to join our Auction and Bidding team, where you will design, build, and optimize high‑scale, high‑performance, low‑latency systems that power real‑time ad auctions and bidding across our marketplace. You will collaborate closely with Product, Data Science, and Machine Learning engineers to turn ideas into production systems, improve marketplace efficiency and yield, and drive continuous optimization through experimentation. As a senior engineer on the team, you will shape technical direction, champion operational excellence, and consistently raise the technical bar as our platform and business continue to grow.

In this role, you will:

• Lead the design, implementation, and evolution of backend services that power ad auction and bidding capabilities and to serve relevant ads and increase advertiser reach to travelers across our ad platform

• Drive operational excellence by improving the reliability, scalability, and latency of mission‑critical services

• Lead operational reviews that use data and incident learnings to drive systemic improvements in resilience, fault-tolerance and operational maturity

• Partner with Product, Data Scientists, and ML Engineers on features such as relevance optimization, targeting, and performance modeling, using experimentation to validate impact

• Apply LLMs and generative AI, where appropriate, to improve ad delivery and automate repetitive tasks at scale

• Mentor and develop engineers across levels through technical guidance, code reviews, and design feedback, consistently raising the team’s technical bar

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field with 8+ years of experience, or Master’s degree with 6+ years , or equivalent related professional experience

• Experience driving the end‑to‑end technical design and delivery of multiple complex, multi‑quarter, cross‑team projects

• Experience collaborating with product and business partners to identify problems and deliver scalable technical solutions

• Strong proficiency in at least one programming language (e.g., Java, Kotlin )

• Experience building and operating backend services in the cloud using real-time streaming technologies (e.g., Apache Flink/Kafka ) and APIs( gRPC/Protobuf )

• Solid understanding of distributed systems, data flows, and operational best practices

• Proven track record of driving operational excellence for large‑scale production services (e.g., availability, latency, on‑call ownership, and incident reviews)

• Experience working with data‑driven systems, Generative AI/ML‑powered features , or experimentation platforms

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with big data tools and frameworks (e.g., PySpark, Databricks)

• Experience with advertising technologies (e.g., Ad serving, Auctions, and bidding)

The total cash range for this position in Chicago is $171,500.00 to $240,000.00. Employees in this role have the potential to increase their pay up to $274,500.00, which is the top of the range, based on ongoing, demonstrated, and sustained performance in the role.

Starting pay for this role will vary based on multiple factors, including location, available budget, and an individual’s knowledge, skills, and experience. Pay ranges may be modified in the future.

Expedia Group is proud to offer a wide range of benefits to support employees and their families, including medical/dental/vision, paid time off, and an Employee Assistance Program. To fuel each employee’s passion for travel, we offer a wellness & travel reimbursement, travel discounts, and an International Airlines Travel Agent (IATAN) membership. View our full list of benefits .

Accommodation requests

If you need assistance with any part of the application or recruiting process due to a disability, or other physical or mental health conditions, please reach out to our Recruiting Accommodations Team through the Accommodation Request .

We are proud to be named as a Best Place to Work on Glassdoor in 2024 and be recognized for award-winning culture by organizations like Forbes, TIME, Disability:IN, and others.

Expedia Group's family of brands includes: Brand Expedia®, Hotels.com®, Expedia® Partner Solutions, Vrbo®, trivago®, Orbitz®, Travelocity®, Hotwire®, Wotif®, ebookers®, CheapTickets®, Expedia Group™ Media Solutions, Expedia Local Expert®, CarRentals.com™, and Expedia Cruises™. © 2024 Expedia, Inc. All rights reserved. Trademarks and logos are the property of their respective owners. CST: 2029030-50

Employment opportunities and job offers at Expedia Group will always come from Expedia Group’s Talent Acquisition and hiring teams. Never provide sensitive, personal information to someone unless you’re confident who the recipient is. Expedia Group does not extend job offers via email or any other messaging tools to individuals with whom we have not made prior contact. Our email domain is @expediagroup.com. The official website to find and apply for job openings at Expedia Group is careers.expediagroup.com/jobs .

Expedia is committed to creating an inclusive work environment with a diverse workforce. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status. This employer participates in E-Verify. The employer will provide the Social Security Administration (SSA) and, if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with information from each new employee's I-9 to confirm work authorization.