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Shield AI, a venture-backed defense-tech company, is seeking a Staff Engineer for Autonomy Software Integration to join the Hivemind Quality team in San Mateo. The Hivemind platform is an AI-powered autonomy software stack that enables customers to build autonomous systems for real-world mission-critical applications.
In this role, you will serve as a systems integration expert for autonomous robotics, developing deep expertise in Shield AI's autonomy stack spanning autonomy behaviors, sensor processing, multi-agent coordination, ground-control systems, and embedded platforms. You will become a power user of the Hivemind SDK, understanding its capabilities from a customer perspective and identifying gaps that need to be addressed.
Key responsibilities include:
• Develop and validate customer use cases, evaluating ease of use for autonomy developers and providing actionable feedback to Engineering and Product teams.
• Integrate new autonomy capabilities into the platform, assessing feature completeness and anticipating novel customer workflows and edge cases.
• Configure, deploy, and integrate multi-agent systems across simulation, hardware-in-the-loop (HIL), and flight platforms, understanding the full system end-to-end from sensor inputs to autonomous behaviors.
• Lead integration of autonomy software onto new robotic hardware platforms, configuring sensor drivers, communication interfaces, and platform adapters.
• Architect and implement integration frameworks, deployment scripts, and configuration management tools that streamline bringing capabilities into Software-in-the-Loop (SIL), HIL, and flight environments.
• Ensure the autonomy stack operates reliably across all supported platforms, operating systems, and deployment configurations, identifying and resolving integration issues across system boundaries.
• Analyze system logs, telemetry, and rosbag data to diagnose integration defects, collaborate with developers to isolate issues, and create analysis tooling to accelerate debugging.
• Partner with DevOps teams to streamline integration pipelines, reduce build-to-deploy cycle times, and ensure robust continuous integration of new features.
• Validate system requirements and interface contracts, assisting in developing tooling to verify end-to-end system compliance and traceability.
This position bridges the gap between engineering development and real-world autonomy applications, ensuring the platform empowers customers to build reliable, mission-ready autonomous systems.
REQUIREMENTS:
• Minimum 7 years of related experience with a bachelor's degree in CS, Computer Engineering, Robotics, or related field; or 6 years with a master's degree; or 4 years with a PhD.
• Proficiency in Python or C++.
• Experience with autonomous systems, server applications, or middleware.
• Demonstrated experience designing integration workflows, communicating system dependencies, and triaging and reporting integration defects across subsystem boundaries.
• Proficiency with simulation tools and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing environments.
• Strong expertise with CI/CD pipelines.
• Strong problem-solving skills and proven track record of delivering high-quality software solutions.
• Excellent communication skills, capable of collaborating effectively across various teams and presenting to customers or technical leadership.
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS:
• Demonstrated experience building complex systems with strong understanding of software architecture and design principles.
• Experience with hardware or embedded systems.
• Expert knowledge of Python.
• Experience with ROS.
• Experience with white box testing.
• Familiarity with networking, operating systems, and radio communications.
• Experience designing automated tooling for testing GUI applications.
• Experience designing automated tooling for testing server applications.
