Senior Software Engineer, Autonomy Behaviors (R4587)

Shield AI•Washington, DC

12h•Onsite

About The Position

As a Senior Software Engineer on the Autonomy Capabilities team at Shield AI, you will build and own autonomy behaviors that directly power our products. You will take responsibility for key components from design through deployment, working across teams to turn complex mission needs into reliable, scalable software. This role involves balancing near-term delivery with long-term maintainability and performance, and you will play a critical part in shaping how autonomy capabilities are designed, integrated, and evolved across our platforms. The Autonomy Capabilities team is a diverse group of experts in software, robotics, control systems, optimization, and data analysis, focused on creating software solutions that significantly enhance customer capabilities. They are responsible for developing autonomous behaviors within Shield AI’s industry-leading mission autonomy software stack and deploying them across various platforms.

Requirements

BS/MS/PhD in Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, or a related field.
Proficient in production-level C++ software development.
5+ years' experience in one or more of the following: software sub-system scheduling and integration, behavior planning, task and resource allocation, motion planning, optimization, or flight controls.
Experience with collaborative software development tools for version control, issue tracking, code reviews, release management.
Ability to contribute to the design, development, and integration of complex software systems as part of a multi-disciplinary team.
Demonstrated problem-solving skills and ability to learn new technologies in a fast-paced environment.
Willingness to collaborate closely with teammates and support team objectives.
Interest in growing technical skills and, over time, providing guidance to more junior engineers.
Desire to work in a highly collaborative, fast paced, and mission-driven environment.
Eligible to obtain and maintain an active U.S. Secret security clearance.

Nice To Haves

Experience working with systems at one or more technology readiness levels (TRLs), including supporting the maturation of research concepts toward operational use.
Experience with mission systems integration, including participation in integration events, testing, or demonstrations.
Experience in one or more of the following areas: Collaborative mission planning, behavior planning, or coordinated teaming.
Motion planning across different vehicle types or constraints.
Sensor/target pairing, control strategies, or related autonomy functions.
Safety systems such as collision avoidance or geofencing.
Experience with robotic software ecosystems (e.g., ROS, OMPL, optimization tools).
Experience with simulation tools for testing and validation.
Familiarity with navigation and communications systems.
Experience contributing to portions of the product development lifecycle.
Familiarity with systems engineering principles.
Familiarity with high-assurance software practices (e.g., DO-178C or similar standards).

Responsibilities

Develop tactical autonomy software to enable unmanned platforms to perform complex missions across air, land, sea, and space domains with limited human supervision.
Implement and test behaviors supporting multi-agent coordination, target engagement, reconnaissance, and survivability in contested scenarios.
Contribute across the software development lifecycle, including requirements, design, implementation, verification, and validation, following established engineering best practices.
Collaborate with senior engineers to design and build scalable, maintainable software components that integrate with broader system architecture (e.g., sensor processing, state estimation, communications, and actuation).
Support reuse and extensibility of autonomy behaviors by contributing to shared frameworks and codebases.
Work with internal product and program teams to deliver capabilities to vehicle platforms, helping ensure successful integration and iteration over time.
Collaborate with cross-functional and external teams to align on interfaces and system requirements.
Apply strong software engineering fundamentals to solve complex technical problems, while continuing to grow domain expertise in autonomy and robotics systems.
Travel up to 20% to support integration, testing, and collaboration with end-users and partner teams.