What is a Software Engineer at Amgen?

At Amgen, if you feel like you are part of something bigger, it is because you are. Our shared mission—to serve patients living with serious illnesses—drives all that we do. As a Software Engineer, you are not just writing code; you are building the technological foundation that enables our global commercial operations, accelerates our research, and supports our environmental sustainability goals. Since 1980, we have helped pioneer the world of biotech, and our engineering teams are critical in delivering innovative medicines to millions of patients across our core therapeutic areas: Oncology, Inflammation, General Medicine, and Rare Disease.

Your role will place you at the intersection of advanced technology and life sciences. You will be instrumental in driving the strategy, development, and implementation of scalable software solutions. Whether you are building reusable accelerators for enterprise applications, integrating state-of-the-art Large Language Models (LLMs) into our internal platforms, or leveraging data science to assess climate risk across our global supply chain, your work will have a tangible, lasting impact.

Expect to operate in an award-winning culture that is collaborative, innovative, and deeply science-based. The scale of our operations requires engineers who are comfortable navigating complex, matrixed environments and who possess a passion for both technical excellence and continuous learning. You will thrive here if you are ready to transform the lives of patients while simultaneously transforming your career.

Common Interview Questions

Getting Ready for Your Interviews

Preparing for an interview at Amgen requires a balanced focus on technical mastery, architectural vision, and cultural alignment. You should approach your preparation by understanding the core competencies our hiring teams evaluate.

Technical & Cloud Proficiency You will be assessed on your ability to build and deploy robust, full-stack applications. Interviewers will look for hands-on experience with modern cloud infrastructure, particularly AWS, as well as your fluency in core programming languages like Python, JavaScript, and SQL.

System Design & Scalability We evaluate your capacity to design reusable, secure, and scalable software platforms. You can demonstrate strength here by articulating how you architect solutions that integrate seamlessly with existing enterprise systems while handling large-scale data and user demands.

Innovation & Advanced Technologies With our increasing focus on AI and machine learning, you will be evaluated on your familiarity with modern frameworks. Candidates stand out by showing practical experience with LLMs, LangChain, vector databases, and MLOps pipelines.

Mission Alignment & Cross-Functional Collaboration Because our work directly impacts patient lives, we look for a deep commitment to our mission. You will be evaluated on your ability to communicate complex technical concepts to diverse audiences, mentor peers, and collaborate effectively with product managers, data scientists, and scientific experts.

Interview Process Overview

The interview process for a Software Engineer at Amgen is designed to be thorough, collaborative, and reflective of our science-based culture. You will typically begin with an initial recruiter screen to align on your background, expectations, and passion for the biotech industry. This is followed by a technical screen with a hiring manager or senior engineer, which focuses on your core programming skills, cloud experience, and high-level architectural understanding.

If successful, you will advance to a virtual onsite loop consisting of several specialized rounds. These sessions dive deeply into system design, advanced technical frameworks (such as AI/ML integration or DevOps practices), and behavioral alignment. Our interviewers rely heavily on data and concrete examples, so you should expect a process that values structured problem-solving over abstract theorizing. We want to see how you approach real-world engineering challenges within a highly regulated, global enterprise.

This visual timeline outlines the typical progression of our interview stages, from the initial screening to the final comprehensive onsite loop. Use this to structure your preparation, ensuring you allocate sufficient time to practice both hands-on coding and high-level system design before the final rounds. Keep in mind that specific stages may vary slightly depending on your exact level and the team you are interviewing with.

Deep Dive into Evaluation Areas

To succeed in your interviews, you must demonstrate proficiency across several key technical and behavioral domains. Our engineers operate across the full stack and are expected to understand the broader impact of their architectural decisions.

Cloud Computing & Platform Engineering

This area tests your ability to build, deploy, and manage applications in the cloud. At Amgen, we rely heavily on cloud-native architectures to ensure our platforms are scalable, secure, and globally accessible. Strong performance means moving beyond basic deployments to discussing infrastructure as code, containerization, and automated pipelines.

Be ready to go over:

• AWS Ecosystem – Deep understanding of services like AWS Lambda, API Gateway, and managed databases.
• Containerization & Orchestration – Experience with Docker and container orchestration systems.
• CI/CD & DevOps – Designing and maintaining automated testing and deployment pipelines.
• Database Architecture – Trade-offs between SQL and NoSQL databases for specific enterprise use cases.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Walk me through how you would design a scalable, serverless architecture using AWS Lambda and API Gateway."
• "Describe a time you optimized a CI/CD pipeline to reduce deployment times across a global engineering team."
• "How do you ensure data security and compliance when integrating a new NoSQL database into an existing enterprise platform?"

AI, Machine Learning & Advanced Frameworks

As Amgen continues to innovate, integrating AI and machine learning into our software platforms is becoming increasingly critical. You will be evaluated on your practical experience with modern AI tools and how you operationalize them within a production environment.

Be ready to go over:

• LLM Integration – Utilizing frameworks like LangChain, LlamaIndex, and agentic frameworks.
• Vector Databases – Managing and querying VectorDBs for advanced search and contextual data retrieval.
• MLOps – Deploying and monitoring machine learning models using tools like Amazon SageMaker and Amazon Bedrock.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Explain how you would build a retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipeline using LangChain and a vector database."
• "What are the key challenges in transitioning a machine learning model from a local environment to production using MLOps best practices?"

System Design & Reusable Architecture

We need engineers who can think at an enterprise scale. This evaluation area focuses on your ability to design systems that are not only effective for a single use case but can be leveraged as reusable accelerators across multiple product teams.

Be ready to go over:

• Microservices Architecture – Decoupling complex monolithic applications into resilient services.
• Governance & Reliability – Developing frameworks to manage platform usage, ensure uptime, and monitor system health.
• Integration – Seamlessly connecting new software platforms with legacy enterprise systems.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Design a global platform service that multiple internal business units can use to access standardized patient data models."
• "How do you balance the need for rapid feature delivery with the necessity of maintaining strict security and governance frameworks?"

Cross-Functional Leadership & Behavioral Fit

Engineering at Amgen is a team effort. You will be assessed on your ability to navigate a matrixed environment, communicate with non-technical stakeholders, and mentor junior engineers. Strong candidates exhibit a collaborative mindset and a clear connection to our patient-first mission.

Be ready to go over:

• Stakeholder Management – Translating business demands from commercial or sustainability teams into technical requirements.
• Mentorship – Fostering a culture of continuous learning and innovation within your team.
• Navigating Ambiguity – Delivering results when project parameters are shifting or complex.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Tell me about a time you had to explain a complex technical trade-off to a non-technical business leader."
• "Describe a situation where you identified a process improvement in the development lifecycle and successfully drove its adoption."