Principal Solutions Architect

#WeAreParamount on a mission to unleash the power of content… you in?
We’ve got the brands, we’ve got the stars, we’ve got the power to achieve our mission to entertain the planet – now all we’re missing is… YOU! Becoming a part of Paramount means joining a team of passionate people who not only recognize the power of content but also enjoy a touch of fun and uniqueness. Together, we co-create moments that matter – both for our audiences and our employees – and aim to leave a positive mark on culture.

In This Role You’ll:

The Principal Solutions Architect is the leading tech expert tasked with improving large media platforms. Their job includes designing new systems, bettering metadata workflows, and upgrading production using AI technology. This role owns the reference architecture for MAM/PAM ecosystems, media supply chains, metadata governance, and next-generation intelligent services. including RAG, vector search, and ML-based enrichment.

The ideal candidate combines deep media engineering expertise, hands-on software development ability, and modern architectural management. They operate as a strategic thinker and a tactical problem solver, supporting mission-critical production environments and guiding teams through technical transformation.

Responsibilities Include:

Architectural Ownership & Design:

• Lead the design of key systems, including Media Asset Management (MAM), Production Asset Management (PAM), metadata management, workflow coordination, and AI-supported production processes. These systems oversee the whole media lifecycle from ingest to production, archiving, and distribution.
• Design and evolve media architectures, including decoupling legacy platforms, introducing modern APIs, and enabling parallel migrations to cloud-native services.
• Define enterprise metadata models and enrichment strategies, including integration of AI-generated metadata (e.g., Twelve Labs or equivalent).
• Architect and deliver AI-driven services such as automated metadata enrichment, semantic search, content discovery, and intelligent support/ops agents using RAG.

Platform & Engineering Management:

• Design developer-friendly platform services, SDKs, and automation frameworks that enable safe, consistent workflow extension by internal engineering teams.
• Lead vendor evaluations, POCs, and platform pilots, progressing them to production-ready implementations with measurable success criteria.
• Establish and maintain architecture, code, and documentation standards. Work to improve the quality and consistency of engineering across all teams and with external partners.
• Serve as the final technical escalation point for complex failures involving MAM, workflows, storage platforms, or AI services.

Operational Partnership & Reliability

• Partner closely with operations and production support teams to ensure architecture is observable, supportable, and resilient.
• Drive improvements in reliability, automation, workflow monitoring, and incident response across media systems.

Technical Mentorship & Influence

• Mentor engineers, raising overall engineering maturity through guidance in design, architecture, and system thinking.

Basic Qualifications You Bring:

• Minimum of 10 years' experience in designing, establishing, and managing large media platforms. Responsibilities include working with MAM/PAM systems and overseeing all stages of media handling: from ingest to production, storage, and retrieval.
• 7+ years architecting cloud and hybrid environments (AWS, GCP, Azure, or OCI) with focus on media workloads, storage tiering, and workflow orchestration.
• 7+ years hands-on software engineering with solid proficiency in Python, modern API development, automation, and CI/CD practices.
• 5+ years of experience in developing systems to organize media. Responsibilities: standardize data, enhance data quality, improve search abilities, and oversee data from start to end.
• Must have 3 years of experience adding AI and ML technologies such as object detection, speech-to-text, and scene/event detection to professional systems for video, audio, and text analysis.
• 3+ years designing and deploying systems leveraging vector search, embeddings, or retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) patterns.

Bonus Skills:

• Must be well-versed in commercial media asset management (MAM) and production asset management (PAM) systems, like Avid MediaCentral/Interplay and Mimir. Must be aware with how their data is organized, how to work with their APIs, and be aware of any restrictions they might have.
• Strong knowledge of media formats, codecs, wrappers, and signals: MXF, MOV, MP4, ProRes, AVC/HEVC, HDR, SDI, SRT, NDI, RTP, etc.
• Proficient with workflow and transcoding systems such as Telestream Vantage or MediaConvert. Can identify and fix issues and enhance system efficiency.
• Hands-on experience integrating video understanding, semantic search, and speech recognition platforms (cloud AI, Twelve Labs, or custom ML).
• Practical experience building or operating RAG architectures using vector databases, embeddings, and LLMs for search, automation, or knowledge retrieval.
• Strong automation background (Python, Bash, PowerShell, JSON/YAML) with focus on reducing operational load.
• Experience with setting up containers (such as Docker) and managing them in actual work environments, along with container orchestration systems (like Kubernetes).
• Solid insight of networking, identity, DNS, firewalls, storage systems, hybrid connectivity, and enterprise infrastructure.
• Working knowledge of Windows/Linux, Active Directory, and SQL databases commonly used in media systems.
• Experience with supporting remote or virtual production environments, like with Leostream, Teradici, or NICE DCV.).
• Familiarity with disciplined change management in live production using tools like ServiceNow, Jira, Asana.
• Demonstrated ability to create clear and useful documents. These are for different readers, such as engineers, operators, and top management. Types of documents include architecture diagrams, decision records, API documentation, and runbooks.

Paramount Skydance Corporation (NASDAQ: PSKY) is a leading global media and entertainment company that creates premium content and experiences for audiences worldwide. Driven by iconic studios, networks and streaming services, Paramount's portfolio of consumer brands includes CBS, Showtime Networks, Paramount Pictures, Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central, BET, Paramount+, and Pluto TV, among others. Paramount delivers the largest share of the U.S. television audience and boasts one of the industry's most important and extensive libraries of TV and film titles. In addition to offering innovative streaming services and digital video products, the company provides powerful capabilities in production, distribution and advertising solutions.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Hiring Salary Range: $150,000.00 - 165,000.00. 

The hiring salary range for this position applies to New York City, California, Colorado, Washington state, and most other geographies. Starting pay for the successful applicant depends on a variety of job-related factors, including but not limited to geographic location, market demands, experience, training, and education.  The benefits available for this position include medical, dental, vision, 401(k) plan, life insurance coverage, disability benefits, tuition assistance program and PTO or, if applicable,  as otherwise dictated by the appropriate Collective Bargaining Agreement. This position is bonus eligible.  

• Attractive compensation and comprehensive benefits packages. Check out our full list of benefits here: https://www.paramount.com/careers/benefits
• Generous paid time off.
• An exciting and fulfilling opportunity to be part of one of Paramount’s most dynamic teams.
• Opportunities for both on-site and virtual engagement events.
• Unique opportunities to make meaningful connections and build a vibrant community, both inside and outside the workplace.
• Explore life at Paramount: https://www.paramount.com/careers/life-at-paramount

Paramount is an equal opportunity employer (EOE) including disability/vet.

At Paramount, the spirit of inclusion feeds into everything that we do, on-screen and off. From the programming and movies we create to employee benefits/programs and social impact outreach initiatives, we believe that opportunity, access, resources and rewards should be available to and for the benefit of all. Paramount is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, creed, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship status, marital status, disability, gender identity, gender expression, and Veteran status.

If you are a qualified individual with a disability or a disabled veteran, you may request a reasonable accommodation if you are unable or limited in your ability to use or access https://www.paramount.com/careers as a result of your disability. You can request reasonable accommodations by calling 212.846.5500 or by sending an email to paramountaccommodations@paramount.com. Only messages left for this purpose will be returned.