Senior Principal Technical Solution Architect

Cerence

10d • $192,500 - $290,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

Cerence is extending its leadership in Voice AI and Conversational Intelligence into Humanoid Robotics, building software platforms that enable robots to understand, reason, communicate, and act in the real world. The Senior Principal Technical Solution Architect owns the end-to-end software architecture for our humanoid robot applications. You will bridge the gap between cutting-edge AI, robotic operating systems, and physical hardware. In this role, you will guide critical technical decisions, manage physical system constraints, and supervise an agile, high-performing startup development team.

Requirements

• Deep understanding of Navigation & Localization (SLAM, Nav2), Manipulation & Motion Planning (MoveIt2), Perception Pipelines, Sensor Fusion, Robot Middleware, DDS communication, and distributed robotics architectures.
• Proven experience designing cyber-physical systems operating under compute limitations, thermal constraints, battery optimization, network intermittency, and fail-safe operational requirements.
• Advanced C++ (17/20) and Python architectural design expertise.
• Strong mastery of Linux (Ubuntu/Debian), containerized deployments, and embedded computing platforms.
• 3+ years managing engineering teams in startup, R&D, robotics, or fast-paced product development environments.
• 8+ years in robotics, autonomous systems, industrial automation, physical AI, or complex cyber-physical environments.
• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Robotics, Software Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related discipline.

Nice To Haves

• Real-Time Linux: PREEMPT_RT and deterministic kernel environments.
• Microcontroller RTOS: Zephyr RTOS, FreeRTOS or low-level embedded control platforms.
• NVIDIA Isaac SDK, Isaac Sim, Omniverse, Gazebo, Webots, Intel RealSense.
• ISO 13849, IEC 61508, IEC 62443 and Human-Robot Interaction safety requirements.
• Experience integrating LLMs, VLMs, agentic workflows, multimodal reasoning and edge AI inference platforms.

Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end application architecture for humanoid robots.
• Define reusable software platforms spanning robotics, AI, voice, cloud, and edge systems.
• Lead technical decisions involving robotics frameworks, operating systems, SDKs, AI infrastructure, and deployment architectures.
• Guide proof-of-concepts into production-ready customer deployments.
• Collaborate with robotics OEMs, technology partners, and cross-functional engineering teams.
• Design scalable, modular software architectures for humanoid robot applications.
• Evaluate and select robotic software frameworks, developer SDKs, etc.
• Collaborate closely with mechanical and electrical teams to optimize system latency, compute allocation, thermal envelopes, battery utilization, and power budgets.
• Drive a platform strategy enabling modular reuse of application logic across different physical robot forms.
• Define how foundation models, agentic orchestration frameworks, memory systems, multimodal AI, and reasoning engines integrate into robot applications.
• Ensure deployed solutions meet reliability, observability, maintainability, security, and operational requirements.
• Lead, mentor, and unblock a small, fast-moving startup team of developers.

Benefits

• Generous compensation and benefits package
• Annual bonus opportunity
• Insurance coverage (medical, dental, vision, life, and disability)
• Paid time off
• Paid holidays
• Company contribution to the RRSP (Registered Retirement Savings Plan)
• Equity awards for certain positions and levels
• Remote and/or hybrid work available depending on the position

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior