Staff Software Engineer, Autonomous Pilot Integration – Emerging Domains (r5401)

Shield AI Shield AI · Defense · Washington, DC +3 · Flight System Integration

Staff Software Engineer role focused on building and integrating autonomy solutions for new platforms and mission areas in defense, including space, maritime, and logistics. The role involves end-to-end ownership from R&D to live testing, requiring new autonomy code development and integration of existing capabilities.

What you'd actually do

  1. lead the technical delivery of complex autonomy capabilities across Emerging Domains, helping establish first-of-their-kind autonomy solutions for new platforms and mission areas.
  2. own challenging integration efforts, influence technical direction across multiple subsystems, and work closely with platform teams and cross-functional engineering organizations to transition early R&D efforts into scalable, operational capabilities.

Skills

Required

  • software engineering
  • autonomy
  • integration
  • R&D
  • platform development
  • mission planning
  • control systems
  • multi-agent systems
  • contingency planning
  • executive autonomy

Nice to have

  • space systems
  • maritime systems
  • unmanned systems
  • logistics platforms
  • motion planning
  • tactics
  • perception systems
  • software-in-the-loop
  • hardware-in-the-loop
  • vehicle-in-the-loop

Other signals

  • builds autonomy solutions for new platforms
  • takes on short-term R&D and integration efforts
  • write new autonomy code
  • own it end-to-end