Lead Audio Engineer

When you join Verizon

Verizon is one of the world’s leading providers of technology and communications services, transforming the way we connect across the globe. We’re a diverse network of people driven by our shared ambition to shape a better future. Here, we have the ability to learn and grow at the speed of technology, and the space to create within every role. Together, we are moving the world forward – and you can too. Dream it. Build it. Do it here.

What you’ll be doing...

Here at Verizon’s Advanced Collaboration Technologies (ACT) group, we push the boundaries of collaboration and communications applications by leveraging emerging and cutting-edge immersive technologies in Virtual and Augmented Reality (or Extended Reality; XR). We are a fast-paced product team building next generation applications, platforms, SDKs, and APIs to enhance the capabilities of our widely used software products. We’re looking for a motivated, creative, and technically knowledgeable engineering manager who is excited to lead our audio team, and to be on the front lines of spatial audio engineering in XR.

• Manage a small team of focused audio engineers, working on spatial audio technologies & content.
• Oversee the engineering management of our MEC Spatial Audio APIs & SDKs, leveraging our custom XR audio engine.
• Collaborate with our audio engineers to design and discuss audio features around 3D spatial audio algorithms, audio networking, and game engine integrations.
• Lead research and development efforts around native augmentations to our in-house custom game engine, such as the development of plugins, the creation of standalone SDKs for use in other applications, etc.
• Play a leading role with our engineers in discussing and spearheading upgrades and innovations to scale our cross-platform WebRTC-based communications stack, to carry voice data to a large, geographically diverse user base.
• Work with our client and server side architectural teams to drive and integrate these innovations.
• Work with our Project Management team to implement processes and plan for scheduled deliverables.
• Work with our UX team to implement user flow and interactions around audio for our products.
• Work with our QA team to promote testing and bug fixes around audio.
• Work with our Legal team to develop new IP, by leading brainstorming sessions, discussion, and review around inventions & patent applications.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with other teams, including those within our Graphics and Computer Vision Programs.
• Promote, foster, and lead innovation within the team to improve and grow our technology base.

What we’re looking for...

You'll need to have:

• Bachelor's degree or four or more years of equivalent work experience.
• Six or more years of relevant work experience.
• Experience in developing VR and AR products in a team environment.
• Experience managing or leading a small team of engineers.
• Experience with the AGILE workflow (working in scrums, sprints, etc.)

Even better if you have:

• Master’s Degree or higher in a related technical field.
• Technical knowledge and understanding of audio engineering concepts, such as DSP algorithms (egs. FFT, sampling, computational reverberation, sound occlusion filtering, etc.)
• Technical understanding of spatial audio concepts (egs. binaural and ambisonics, acoustics, echo cancellation, etc.)
• Experience with audio streaming and networking setups (voice chat, client-server encoding/decoding architectures and pipelines, etc.)
• Experience with audio content & music production, sound design, asset formats (WAV, etc.), and DAWs (Pro Tools, etc.)
• Familiarity working across desktop and mobile platforms (Windows, Android, Linux, iOS, OSX).
• Strong decision-making skills that champion and promote the role of audio in application development.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to work efficiently in a team/independently.
• Basic understanding of programming concepts (C++), and a willingness to learn about additional languages and build systems, such as Java, Objective C, CMake, Gradle.
• Experience with networking applications, such as those dealing with WebRTC, UDP, TCP, MCU & SFU, P2P, and client-server style architectures.
• Experience with OpenAL.
• Experience with game audio middleware such as Wwise and/or FMOD.
• Experience with real time audio application development & multi-threading.
• Experience with codecs & encoding such as WAV, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC, Opus.
• Professional experience with any of the following: acoustics, raytracing, linear algebra.
• Experience with IP creation, with 1 or more patents granted or pending.
• Familiarity with many of the tools and technologies we use in development: Git, Bitbucket, Perforce, Jenkins, Docker, JIRA, and Confluence.

Equal Employment Opportunity

We're proud to be an equal opportunity employer - and celebrate our employees' differences, including race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, and Veteran status. At Verizon, we know that diversity makes us stronger. We are committed to a collaborative, inclusive environment that encourages authenticity and fosters a sense of belonging. We strive for everyone to feel valued, connected, and empowered to reach their potential and contribute their best. Check out our diversity and inclusion page to learn more.

COVID-19 Vaccination Requirement

Verizon requires new hires to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Verizon provides reasonable accommodations consistent with legal requirements (e.g., for medical or religious reasons).