Product Manager, Interactive Avatars

About the role

You will own the strategy and execution of Synthesia's Interactive Avatars product, defining how developers build, integrate, and ship real-time avatar experiences. This role requires you to translate raw AI research and early beta feedback into a coherent, scalable product vision that balances developer needs with commercial viability. You will partner directly with engineering and research teams to shape the real-time avatar stack and ensure the API feels intuitive, reliable, and powerful. You will define the roadmap for the Interactive Avatar platform, from core capabilities to advanced features, while maintaining a sharp focus on user experience and production readiness. This is a rare opportunity to build a new product category from the ground up, working at the intersection of real-time communication, AI, and developer platforms. You will be responsible for closing the gap between cutting-edge AI research and the practical needs of developers building mission-critical applications. Your decisions will directly influence how the world's largest enterprises adopt real-time avatar technology.

Key facts

What you'll do

Define and own the end-to-end Interactive Avatar API, including the developer-facing SDK, integration patterns, documentation, and the journey from closed beta to general availability.

Conduct deep interviews with developers and design partners using the beta to uncover integration pain points, real-time behavior requirements, and what production-readiness means across different use cases.

Translate qualitative developer feedback into a clear, prioritized product roadmap that balances innovation, usability, and technical feasibility.

Collaborate closely with engineering and research teams building the real-time avatar stack to craft specifications, evaluate trade-offs between quality, latency, and cost, and ensure alignment on implementation details.

Shape the commercial strategy for the Interactive Avatar API, including packaging, pricing models, and sales motions tailored to the unique characteristics of real-time AI.

Establish and track key product metrics covering adoption, integration success, real-time performance quality, system reliability, and commercial traction to guide decision-making.

Build and maintain strong relationships with early design partners, synthesizing their input into actionable product improvements and long-term vision.

Champion the developer experience by ensuring the API is intuitive, well-documented, and robust, reducing the time and risk for developers building with real-time avatars.

Define the standards and best practices that make interactive avatars reliable and consistent across different deployments, sessions, and integrations.

Act as the primary interface between the technical implementation of the real-time avatar platform and external stakeholders, aligning expectations and communicating progress clearly.

Lead experiments to validate hypotheses about developer workflows, feature usage, and willingness to adopt new capabilities as the platform scales.

Requirements

You have owned a developer-facing product such as an API, SDK, or platform and understand that the product is the developer experience.

You know that adoption is won or lost in the first hour of integration and that trust is won or lost the first time something breaks in production, and you build accordingly.

You are comfortable operating in an environment where the roadmap is not fully formed and you do not need a complete brief to begin working.

You can engage directly with developers, observe them integrating, synthesize what you learn, and return with a clear point of view.

You are honest about what you do not know and are willing to update your understanding quickly when presented with new evidence.

You care deeply about details and can hold a high quality bar for experiences that are subjective and technically challenging, such as real-time avatar presence and responsiveness.

You understand the tension between ambitious product ideas and the constraints of latency, cost, and reliability in production systems.

You are comfortable making decisions with incomplete information while maintaining clarity on trade-offs and communicating them to stakeholders.

Nice to have

Experience working with AI, voice, video, or real-time communication systems.

Background in platform or infrastructure products that serve external developers.

Experience collaborating with research teams in fast-paced, experimental environments.

Understanding of the technical challenges around streaming, latency, and synchronization in real-time applications.

Practical notes

This role is based in Seattle and is a full-time position.

The position operates in an at-will employment context under local laws.

Relocation support may be available for qualified candidates based on company policy.

Candidates must be authorized to work in the country where the position is located without requiring company sponsorship for work authorization at the time of hire.

Travel may be required occasionally for meetings with design partners or internal stakeholders.

Visa sponsorship considerations are evaluated on a case-by-case basis in alignment with company policies and local regulations.