Job Description

We are looking for an Applied Scientist III to set the scientific direction for the next generation of agentic AI applications that guide Amazon advertisers. In this role you will define, lead and build the science behind agentic systems that reason, plan, and act autonomously to manage and optimize ad campaigns based on a deep understanding of the advertiser and the marketplace. You will own the agentic architecture end to end, partnering closely with product and engineering leaders to translate a long-term science vision into concrete research and engineering roadmaps.

Working backwards from the needs of millions of advertisers, you will take the lead on medium-to-large, ambiguous problems where neither the problem nor the solution is well defined, and deliver customer-facing products that help advertisers create, optimize, and grow their campaigns. You will invent new methods at the product level, and drive their adoption across multiple teams. This role combines science leadership, technical depth, product focus, and business understanding: you will raise the science bar, build consensus on approach across partners, and mentor scientists and engineers while remaining deeply hands-on with the hardest technical problems.

Key job responsibilities
As an Applied Scientist III on this team you will:
- Define the science vision for the agentic campaign management system and, with product and engineering leaders, turn it into delivery roadmaps.
- Build agentic systems that autonomously manage and optimize ad campaigns — encoding auction and marketplace dynamics (bidding, budget pacing, keyword and targeting decisions) while balancing advertiser ROI, shopper experience, and marketplace health.
- Define and curate the datasets and signals needed to train and evaluate these agents — advertiser and campaign data, auction and bid/budget signals, impressions, clicks, conversions, and search-term/keyword performance.
- Stay deeply hands-on: write production-quality, critical-path code and build core components that take agentic systems from prototype to launch.
- Own the agentic architecture — planning, tool use and integration (e.g., MCP), long-horizon reasoning (e.g., ReAct, CoT/ToT), and multi-agent orchestration — and stay deeply hands-on, writing production-quality, critical-path code from prototype to launch.
- Define the evaluation and safety methodology for agent workflows and drive its adoption as the bar for reliability and trust.
- Drive the team's scientific agenda, mentor scientists and engineers, and represent the team in the internal and external scientific community.

About the team
The Sponsored Products and Brands team at Amazon Ads is re-imagining the advertising landscape through the latest generative AI technologies, revolutionizing how millions of customers discover products and engage with brands across Amazon.com and beyond. We are at the forefront of re-inventing advertising experiences, bridging human creativity with artificial intelligence to transform every aspect of the advertising lifecycle from ad creation and optimization to performance analysis and customer insights.

We are a passionate group of innovators dedicated to developing responsible and intelligent AI technologies that balance the needs of advertisers, enhance the shopping experience, and strengthen the marketplace. If you're energized by solving complex challenges and pushing the boundaries of what's possible with AI, join us in shaping the future of advertising.

This team within Sponsored Products and Brands is focused on guiding and supporting millions of advertisers to meet their advertising needs of creating and managing ad campaigns. At this scale, the complexity of diverse advertiser goals, campaign types, and market dynamics creates both a massive technical challenge and a transformative opportunity: even small improvements in guidance systems can have outsized impact on advertiser success and Amazon’s retail ecosystem.

Our vision is to build a highly personalized, context-aware agentic advertiser guidance system that leverages LLMs together with tools such as auction simulations, ML models, and optimization algorithms. This agentic framework, will operate across both chat and non-chat experiences in the ad console, scaling to natural language queries as well as autonomously manage campaigns based on deep understanding of the advertiser. To execute this vision, we collaborate closely with stakeholders across Ad Console, Sales, and Marketing to identify opportunities—from high-level product guidance down to granular keyword recommendations—and deliver them through a tailored, personalized experience. Our work is grounded in state-of-the-art agent architectures, tool integration, reasoning frameworks, and model customization approaches (including tuning, MCP, and preference optimization), ensuring our systems are both scalable and adaptive.

Basic Qualifications

- 5+ years of building machine learning models for business application experience
- PhD, or Master's degree and 6+ years of applied research experience
- Experience programming in Java, C++, Python or related language
- Experience with neural deep learning methods and machine learning

Preferred Qualifications

- Experience with modeling tools such as R, scikit-learn, Spark MLLib, MxNet, Tensorflow, numpy, scipy etc.
- Experience with large scale distributed systems such as Hadoop, Spark etc.
- Experience building high-velocity ad products
- Experience in developing and deploying LLMs in production on GPUs, Neuron, TPU or other AI acceleration hardware, or experience with interrupt service routines

Amazon is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected veteran status, disability, or other legally protected status.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Our inclusive culture empowers Amazonians to deliver the best results for our customers. If you have a disability and need a workplace accommodation or adjustment during the application and hiring process, including support for the interview or onboarding process, please visit https://amazon.jobs/content/en/how-we-hire/accommodations for more information. If the country/region you’re applying in isn’t listed, please contact your Recruiting Partner.

The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits

USA, CA, Palo Alto - 192,200.00 - 260,000.00 USD annually
USA, NY, New York - 183,800.00 - 248,700.00 USD annually
USA, WA, SEATTLE - 167,100.00 - 226,100.00 USD annually