- Robot type
- Autonomous Vehicle
- Location
- BostonMassachusettsUSA
- Job type
- Software
- Posted
- Jul 21, 2025
- Salary
- $240,000–$330,000 a year
Principal Engineer Motion Planning
Job description
The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors including but not limited to specific skills, experience and expertise, role location, certifications, licenses, and business needs. The estimated compensation range listed in this job posting reflects base salary only. This role may include additional forms of compensation such as a bonus or company equity. The recruiter assigned to this role can share more information about the specific compensation and benefit details associated with this role during the hiring process.
Job responsibilities
- Lead the research and development of novel algorithms and sub-systems for motion planning in autonomous driving, thereby expanding the Operational Design Domain.
- Lead cross-functional projects to define new or upgrade existing interfaces to solve problems
- Monitor overall system performance to identify areas for improvement and develop technical strategies to address deficiencies
- Guide cross-functional project teams to provide comprehensive solutions and demonstrate the ability to think beyond the confines of the planning system.
- Architect and integrate complex combinations of motion planning and prediction algorithms, driving their evaluation and refinement for real-world deployment.
- Design and build a robust, scalable, and high-performance codebase that facilitates rapid exploration, prototyping, and rigorous evaluation of innovative motion planning approaches and algorithms.
- Drive technical collaboration and interface seamlessly with perception and prediction components upstream and trajectory optimization, tracking and control components downstream, ensuring end-to-end system performance.
- Leverage your deep software development and research expertise to teach others better software practices and principles, fostering a culture of technical excellence.
Job requirements
- PhD preferred in Robotics, Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, or a related field; or a Master's degree with 7+ years of experience in the robotics (preferably AV industry).
- 10+ years of research experience in robotics / motion planning, with a proven track record of contributing to state-of-the-art solutions and leading significant projects.
- 5+ years of C++ software development, with an emphasis on developing high-performance and reliable systems.
- Past experience owning and leading technical development on complex features from problem formulation through research, implementation, and deployment in a production environment, demonstrating significant impact.
- Thirst for knowledge, continuous innovation, and a drive to push the boundaries of autonomous driving technology, acting as a technical thought leader.
- Experience with probabilistic models, including but not limited to Gaussian mixture models, Hidden Markov Models, and Particle Filters.
- Experience with machine learning techniques (such as Bayesian modeling and inference techniques) for decision making under uncertainty.
- Experience with the Bazel build framework
Similar jobs
Motional · Software
Senior Software Engineer, Data Platform
Boston, Massachusetts · Las Vegas, Nevada · Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Motional · Software
Senior Software Engineer, Autonomy Actions Sustaining
Boston, Massachusetts · Las Vegas, Nevada · Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Motional · Software
Senior Full Stack Engineer, Data Mining
Boston, Massachusetts · Las Vegas, Nevada · Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Motional · Software
Motion Planning Engineer - Trajectory Generation
Boston, Massachusetts · Las Vegas, Nevada · Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
