Software Development Engineer III, Advertising Technology

At Expedia Group, we help travelers explore the world, one journey at a time. As a global travel company powered by passionate people, trusted partnerships, and leading technology, we connect travelers, partners, and advertisers through our consumer brands, B2B network, and travel advertising business. Here, you'll do meaningful work that helps millions of people discover, book, and experience travel with more ease, confidence, and joy. Our five Behaviors-Traveler First, Think Big, Operate with Excellence, Ownership Mindset, and Succeed Together-help foster a supportive environment where people can grow their careers and have the flexibility, benefits, and support to do their best work. Join us and build for travelers everywhere.

Introduction to the team

Expedia Group Advertising builds the platforms and experiences that connect advertisers with millions of travelers across the globe. 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’re seeking a Software Development Engineer III to join our Advertising Technology team. You’ll build and operate real-time ad delivery systems that power ad ranking, auctions, bidding, and budget enforcement at scale. These services sit on the critical path of ad delivery, where low latency, correctness, and reliability directly impact revenue, advertiser ROI, and traveler experience.

You’ll work with Product, Machine Learning, Data Science, and Platform teams to integrate with APIs and microservices, bring ML-driven signals into high-throughput backend services, and scale the platform as the business grows.

In this role, you will:

Optimize bidding, ranking and pacing for guaranteed and non-guaranteed ad delivery to surface more relevant ads and expand advertiser reach to travelersBuild and scale systems that support ad serving and ad selection across Expedia Group’s advertising networkApply strong software design principles, algorithms, and data structures to build scalable, low-latency, high-throughput services.Work closely with Product, ML data scientists and data teams on features such as relevance optimization, targeting, and performance modelingAdvocate for high-quality code, automated testing, and strong observability practicesParticipate in operational reviews and drive continuous improvementMentor junior engineers, lead design discussions, and help elevate the technical bar of the teamMinimum Qualifications:

Bachelor's or Master’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field5+ years of experience in backend software developmentExperience working with data-driven systems, ML-powered features, or A/B experimentation platformsStrong proficiency in Java or KotlinExperience building and deploying backend APIs (e.g. gRPC) and streaming or batch data processing services (e.g., Flink, Spark) in cloud environmentsSolid understanding of distributed systems, data flows, and operational best practicesPreferred Qualifications:

Experience with search and retrieval systems, including relevance ranking, vector databases, embeddings, or AI/semantic searchExperience designing and implementing agent-to-agent (A2A) and multi-agent AI systemsBackground in ads, marketplaces, e-commerce, or travel platformsLocation:

Please note that this role is only available in Chicago, IL, in alignment with our flexible work model, which requires employees to be in the office at least three days a week. We are unable to offer relocation assistance for this role.

The total cash range for this position in Chicago is $136,000.00 to $190,500.00. Employees in this role have the potential to increase their pay up t