Robotics Lead

Atoms•San Francisco, CA

2d•$255,000 - $322,000•Onsite

About The Position

Atoms is building the machines that power the next era of progress. Over the last decade, software has transformed the digital world. But the physical world, where food is made, minerals are mined, goods are moved, and industries are run, remains far less intelligent, far less efficient, and far more constrained. We’re changing that. Atoms builds Physical AI— real-world robots for the industries that move civilization forward, starting with food, mining, and transport. Our systems are designed to understand, predict, and control the real world with precision, turning complex physical operations into something more reliable, more scalable, and more productive. This work requires more than robotics. It requires deep integration across hardware, software, AI, operations, manufacturing, and real estate. We don’t just build machines in a lab. We deploy them into real environments, operate them, learn from them, and improve them until they work at scale. We are roboticists, engineers, operators, and builders. We believe the next great technology companies will not only transform information, but the physical systems that shape everyday life. If you want to work on hard problems with real-world impact, join us.

Requirements

Significant experience developing robotics, autonomous vehicles, or other complex autonomous systems.
Deep technical expertise in one or more of: Motion planning and trajectory generation, Prediction and decision-making, Localization and state estimation, Controls, Robotics systems architecture, Autonomous vehicle systems.
Strong understanding of how perception, planning, localization, controls, and vehicle systems interact within a production autonomy stack.
Strong programming skills in C++ and/or Python.
Experience designing and debugging complex real-time robotic systems.
Demonstrated ability to lead major technical initiatives and make architecture-level decisions.
Experience taking robotics or autonomy capabilities from development through real-world deployment.
Strong communication skills and ability to work across highly specialized engineering teams.

Nice To Haves

Experience building production autonomous vehicle systems.
Experience with real-time, safety-critical, or highly reliable robotic systems.
Knowledge of vehicle dynamics, sensor systems, and embedded or onboard compute.
Experience with simulation, closed-loop evaluation, and autonomous-system validation.
Experience integrating machine learning models into robotics or autonomy systems.
Experience diagnosing long-tail failures using vehicle logs, simulation, and real-world testing.
Experience mentoring senior engineers or providing technical leadership across multiple teams.

Responsibilities

Define and drive the technical direction of the robotics and autonomy stack.
Lead architecture and integration across perception, localization, prediction, planning, controls, and vehicle systems.
Develop and improve algorithms for motion planning, trajectory generation, decision-making, and vehicle control.
Own complex system-level problems that span multiple components of the autonomy stack.
Diagnose real-world autonomy failures and drive improvements across algorithms, software, sensors, and vehicle systems.
Establish evaluation and validation methodologies that connect component-level performance to vehicle behavior.
Partner with AI Research and Perception teams to integrate learned models into the broader autonomy system.
Work closely with software, hardware, firmware, simulation, and vehicle engineering teams to bring autonomous capabilities into production.
Provide technical mentorship and raise the engineering bar across the robotics organization.