Founded by fans, Crunchyroll delivers the art and culture of anime to a passionate community. We super-serve over 100 million anime and manga fans across 200+ countries and territories, and help them connect with the stories and characters they crave. Whether that experience is online or in-person, streaming video, theatrical, games, merchandise, events and more, it’s powered by the anime content we all love.
Join our team, and help us shape the future of anime!
In the role of Staff Data Engineer for Concepts Lab, you will report to the VP of the Concepts Lab.
We are considering applicants for the location of Los Angeles, CA (onsite).
As the Staff Data Engineer for Concepts Lab, you will be the technical anchor for everything data in the lab: designing and building the pipelines, reports, and tooling that turn raw signals from experiments into insights that shape our roadmap.
You will move fluidly between hands-on analytics work, and partnership with PMs, designers, and engineers across the company. Success in your first year looks like a Concepts Lab where every new idea has a clear, trustworthy path from question to data to decision and where the team ships faster because of the foundation you have built.
Core Areas of Responsibility- Own the reliability of AI systems in the lab, including designing eval frameworks, instrumenting observability for LLM-based pipelines, and building the validation and structured-output layers that make model outputs trustworthy.
- Architect and build the end-to-end data foundation for Concepts Lab on Databricks (Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, Spark, Databricks SQL), spanning ingestion from AWS and GCP sources through to curated, analytics-ready datasets.
- Lead data modeling and transformation work by defining the dimensional models, semantic layers, and metrics that the lab and our partners across Crunchyroll rely on for experimentation and decision-making.
- Perform hands-on analytics: write the SQL, build the dashboards, and run the exploratory analyses that turn lab concepts into evidence, partnering directly with PMs and product leaders on the questions that matter.
- Set the technical bar for the lab’s data work, including design reviews, code quality, observability, cost management, and security practices, and mentor engineers and analysts who collaborate with us.
- Partner across teams to move successful concepts from prototype into production, working at the inflection point between central Data and Platform teams and upstream and downstream Software Engineering teams to hand off systems that scale beyond the lab.
We get excited about candidates, like you, because…
- You have 12+ years of professional experience building production data systems, with a track record of operating as a senior individual contributor or technical lead.
- You have hands-on experience making AI systems production-grade by designing trace-based evaluations, instrumenting observability for LLM pipelines (with tools like LangSmith, Langfuse, or Datadog), and enforcing structured outputs in real production environments.
- You possess deep expertise in Databricks, including Spark (PySpark and/or Scala), Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, Databricks SQL.
- You are equally strong in SQL and dimensional data modeling, and have shipped warehouse layers and semantic models that analysts and stakeholders actually trust and use.
- You write production-grade Python and have built data pipelines with modern orchestration tools (Airflow, Dagster, dbt, or similar) on AWS and/or GCP.
- You have done substantive analytics work yourself beyond just enabling others and can take an ambiguous business question and drive it to a clear, data-supported answer.
- You have experience working in early-stage, ambiguous environments where you define the problem as much as you solve it, and you know when to prototype quickly versus when to build for the long term.
- Experience in media, streaming, or gaming
- Experience working in an innovation lab, incubation environment, or R&D organization
- Experience with Datadog, Mixpannel, and Mux
The Concepts Lab is Crunchyroll’s R&D and incubation group, focused on exploring new ideas, technologies, and experiences for anime fans. The team partners closely with engineering, product, and business leaders to test assumptions, build evidence, and transition validated concepts into delivery teams.
Our work spans early discovery through beta execution, with an emphasis on learning quickly, reducing risk, and setting teams up for long-term success.
Why you will love working at CrunchyrollIn addition to getting to work with fun, passionate and inspired colleagues, you will also enjoy the following benefits and perks:
- Receive a great compensation package including salary plus performance bonus earning potential, paid annually.
- Flexible time off policies allowing you to take the time you need to be your whole self.
- Generous medical, dental, vision, STD, LTD, and life insurance
- Health Saving Account HSA program
- Health care and dependent care FSA
- 401(k) plan, with employer match
- Employer paid commuter benefit
- Support program for new parents
- Pet insurance and some of our offices are pet friendly!
#LifeAtCrunchyroll #LI-onsite
We want to be everything for someone rather than something for everyone and we do this by living and modeling our values in all that we do. We value
Courage. We believe that when we overcome fear, we enable our best selves.
Curiosity. We are curious, which is the gateway to empathy, inclusion, and understanding.
- Kaizen. We have a growth mindset committed to constant forward progress.
Service. We serve our community with humility, enabling joy and belonging for others.
Our mission of helping people belong reflects our commitment to diversity & inclusion. It's just the way we do business.
We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at Crunchyroll. Pursuant to applicable law, we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.
Crunchyroll, LLC is an independently operated joint venture between US-based Sony Pictures Entertainment, and Japan's Aniplex, a subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment (Japan) Inc., both subsidiaries of Tokyo-based Sony Group Corporation.
Questions about Crunchyroll’s hiring process? Please check out our Hiring FAQs: https://help.crunchyroll.com/hc/en-us/articles/360040471712-Crunchyroll-Hiring-FAQs
Please refer to our Candidate Privacy Policy for more information about how we process your personal information, and your data protection rights: https://tbcdn.talentbrew.com/company/22978/v1_0/docs/spe-jobs-privacy-policy-update-for-crpa-dec-21-22.pdf
Please beware of recent scams to online job seekers. Those applying to our job openings will only be contacted directly from @crunchyroll.com email account.
Skills Required
- 12+ years of professional experience in production data systems
- Hands-on experience with AI systems in production
- Expertise in Databricks, Spark, Delta Lake
- Strong in SQL and dimensional data modeling
- Production-grade Python programming and data pipeline experience
- Analytics work to derive data-supported answers
- Experience in early-stage, ambiguous environments
What the Team is Saying
What We Do
At Crunchyroll, we deliver what anime fans love—anytime, anywhere. With the world’s largest anime streaming library, we connect fans to the stories, characters, and creators they love. But Crunchyroll is more than just a destination to watch anime—it's a global ecosystem where anime lives and breathes beyond the screen. From streaming and theatrical releases to merch, games, news, events, and music, we offer fans immersive experiences that celebrate anime culture in all its forms. Headquartered in the U.S. with teams and reach across the globe, Crunchyroll is an independently operated joint venture between Sony Pictures Entertainment and Aniplex of Japan. This unique partnership gives us the power to scale globally while staying rooted in anime’s cultural origins, ensuring authenticity and access for fans everywhere. We believe anime is more than entertainment—it’s a way of life. And we’re here to champion that passion every day.
Why Work With Us
We take the People Experience seriously here at Crunchyroll. Join a diverse team of talented, ambitious people who treat each other well and believe that how we win is just as important as winning.
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Crunchyroll Offices
Hybrid Workspace
Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.
Three in-person days per week. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays are the company-wide days for ALL team members to be in the office, and individuals may choose to come in more if they please.
