Principal Robotics Software Engineer

ABOUT THE ROLE Join the robotics team at a defense technology company developing autonomous systems to detect and counter unmanned aerial threats. This is a senior, hands-on individual contributor role focused on production robotics software running on real hardware. WHAT YOU'LL DO - Write and own critical production C++ across the robotics stack. - Define and maintain system-wide timing and safety contracts from perception through control. - Take software from prototype to dependable field releases, including packaging, deployment, CI/CD, quality assurance, and hardware-in-the-loop testing. - Mentor and grow the robotics team while continuing to contribute code directly. - Debug hardware and field issues, including during regular range tests. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR - 10 or more years of hands-on robotics software engineering experience and a record of shipping systems. - Recent, hands-on production C++ experience on physical robotic systems. - Experience taking robotics software from prototype to repeatable use in field, operator, fleet, or customer settings. - System-level experience with timing, threading, latency, and reliability, as well as release processes, deployment, CI/CD, quality assurance, or hardware-in-the-loop testing. - Broad robotics experience across sensors, perception, tracking, control, middleware, and deployment; familiarity with sensor timestamps, time synchronization, or coordinate transforms is valuable. - Experience mentoring or growing a team while remaining an individual contributor. - ROS or ROS2 and experience with cameras, IMUs, encoders, or gimbal systems are useful. Defense, aerospace, safety-critical software, systems languages beyond C++, sensor fusion, or an active security clearance are also valuable. - Must meet applicable U.S. person requirements for export-controlled work. COMPENSATION & BENEFITS Base salary: $235,000 to $305,000 annually. Visa sponsorship is not available. LOCATION On-site five days per week in San Francisco, California, United States, with range days included.