Chief Engineer, Autonomous Flight

Anduril Anduril · Defense · Costa Mesa, CA · Air Dominance & Strike : Mission Autonomy Engineering : Mission Software Engineering

Chief Engineer role at Anduril, a defense technology company, focusing on the technical architecture and system-level design of onboard autonomy stacks, command and control systems, and modular payloads for next-generation autonomous platforms. The role involves leading software-heavy robotics systems, guiding engineering teams from design to deployment, and overseeing hardware/software integration and testing. Experience with autonomous systems, mission-critical DoD systems, and edge AI/ML deployment on physical systems is required.

What you'd actually do

  1. Lead systems engineering, requirements decomposition, and technical architecture for software-heavy robotics systems.
  2. Guide small, fast-moving groups of individual contributors through the design, implementation, and deployment phases of emerging programs.
  3. Oversee hardware/software integration and testing (simulation, hardware-in-the-loop, and field testing) to ensure perception, motion planning, and task allocation algorithms run seamlessly on physical platforms.
  4. Partner with Product Managers and Business Development to convert customer mission needs and operational concepts into concrete technical milestones.
  5. Decide technical trade-offs across concurrent programs, helping teams prioritize engineering efforts.

Skills

Required

  • directing technical architecture
  • guiding individual contributors
  • lead engineer
  • developing and fielding software-heavy robotics
  • autonomous systems
  • aerospace products
  • hardware/software integration skills
  • robotics software architectures
  • tactical mission systems
  • autonomous systems
  • mission-critical Department of Defense systems
  • tactical edge technologies

Nice to have

  • Motion Planning
  • Perception
  • Command & Control
  • SLAM
  • task allocation
  • tactical networking
  • multi-domain unmanned systems (air, ground, or maritime)
  • edge-AI/ML deployment on autonomous physical systems

What the JD emphasized

  • software-heavy robotics systems
  • autonomous systems
  • mission-critical Department of Defense systems
  • edge-AI/ML deployment on autonomous physical systems

Other signals

  • autonomous systems
  • AI-powered operating system
  • computer vision
  • sensor fusion
  • robotics