Autonomous Vehicle Lead, Firmware Engineering

ALSO • Palo Alto, CA

7d • $240,000 - $290,000

About The Position

We’re ALSO, an electric mobility company originally conceived as a part of Rivian. We’re a passionate team of builders, dreamers, doers and innovators, focused on creating entirely new (not to mention, innovative and delightful) vertically integrated, small EVs designed to meet the global mobility challenges of today and tomorrow. Our mission is to inspire everyone to ride ALSO—replacing many local car, truck and SUV miles with ones on vehicles that are more affordable, more enjoyable and 10-50x more efficient.
In this role, you will lead firmware integration for a new autonomous vehicle program supporting a commercial delivery partnership. You will own vehicle-level firmware integration across the program while helping define and bring up a new, higher-compute vehicle control unit (VCU) architecture that is unique to this vehicle. Working closely with firmware engineers across platform pods, you will align module development, integration, validation, and release readiness to get the vehicle built and launched.
You will serve as the firmware integration lead across a distributed set of ECUs and compute domains, driving technical decisions at the vehicle level and ensuring that pod-level firmware work comes together cleanly in the full system. This is a hands-on technical leadership role for someone who is equally comfortable with architecture, debugging, planning, and cross-functional execution.

Requirements

• Significant experience in embedded software or firmware development, including strong ownership of vehicle-level or system-level integration.
• Proven success leading firmware delivery across multiple teams, ECUs, or subsystems in a complex hardware-software product.
• Deep expertise in C/C++ and debugging distributed embedded systems.
• Strong experience with vehicle communication and integration protocols such as CAN, CAN-FD, LIN, Ethernet, SPI, and I2C.
• Experience bringing up new control units, central compute modules, or other complex embedded platforms from early development through integration.
• Strong understanding of both low-level firmware and system architecture, including tradeoffs across performance, cost, reliability, safety, and serviceability.
• Experience working across RTOS and/or embedded Linux environments.
• Experience building and maintaining CI/CD, automated test infrastructure, and release processes for embedded products.
• Excellent communication and execution skills, with the ability to operate as a technical lead across platform pods and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Ability to work independently, drive decisions, and unblock teams without needing detailed direction.

Nice To Haves

• Experience with autonomous vehicle platforms, robotics, or delivery vehicles.
• Familiarity with functional safety and safety-critical system integration.
• Experience with HIL/SIL/VIL workflows, fleet telemetry, or field issue investigation.
• Advanced degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.

Responsibilities

• Own firmware integration for the autonomous vehicle program, serving as the primary point of contact for vehicle-level firmware issues.
• Lead definition, bring-up, and maturation of a new high-compute VCU architecture that does not exist on other vehicle platforms.
• Partner closely with firmware engineers in platform pods to align development priorities, integration targets, and delivery timing.
• Drive sprint-level and milestone-level integration planning, including feature readiness, merge strategy, release coordination, and communication to stakeholders.
• Lead end-to-end system integration across distributed ECUs, including interface definition, handshaking, startup sequencing, power states, diagnostics, and fault handling.
• Contribute hands-on to firmware and interface development where needed, especially in areas that unblock system integration and vehicle readiness.
• Work cross-functionally with Electrical, Mechanical, Systems, Test, Validation, Autonomy, and Program teams to define interfaces, debug issues, and close gaps quickly.
• Develop and oversee test and validation plans for firmware functionality, stability, and performance across bench, HIL, and vehicle environments.
• Own the quality of integrated software drops by improving CI/CD, regression coverage, and release discipline for embedded systems.
• Support prototype bring-up, pre-production builds, vehicle testing, fleet issue triage, and launch readiness.

Benefits

• Robust health coverage. Excellent health, dental and vision insurance covered up to 100% by ALSO with FSA & HSA options.
• One Medical membership and dedicated insurance advocates.
• Rich fertility and family building benefits with Progyny.
• Flexible time off.
• 401(k) match.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Education Level: No Education Listed