- Robot type
- Marine and Space
- Location
- AlamedaCaliforniaUSA
- Job type
- Software
- Posted
- Sep 21, 2026
- Salary
- $144,500–$322,742 a year
Full-time
Software Engineer, Autonomous Systems
Job description
You will work across the autonomy stack, applying strong software engineering and robotics expertise to problems such as perception, localization, planning, decision-making, and vehicle behavior. The work spans algorithm implementation, system integration, testing, and field validation, with the opportunity to work on autonomous systems operating for long periods in challenging environments far from human operators.
Saildrone is a maritime defense company and the global leader in autonomous unmanned surface vehicles (USVs). With more ocean miles and real-world operational experience than any USV manufacturer or operator, Saildrone maintains active, combat-deployed systems supporting…
Job responsibilities
- Design, implement, and deploy production autonomy software in C++.
- Develop and integrate algorithms for autonomous perception, localization, planning, navigation, decision-making, or vehicle behavior.
- Evaluate algorithmic approaches and make practical tradeoffs among accuracy, robustness, computational cost, latency, and reliability.
- Integrate autonomy software with sensors, vehicle systems, and other components of the autonomous system.
- Use simulation, testing, telemetry, and real-world vehicle data to validate behavior and diagnose failures.
- Improve the robustness and performance of autonomous capabilities as they move from development into fielded systems.
- Contribute to the architecture and evolution of Saildrone's next-generation autonomy stack.
Job requirements
- Strong C++ software engineering skills and experience building production-quality software.
- Hands-on experience developing software for autonomous systems, robotics, or other complex physical systems.
- Deep technical expertise in at least one area of autonomy, such as perception, localization, state estimation, planning, navigation, controls, or decision-making.
- Strong understanding of the algorithms and engineering tradeoffs relevant to autonomous systems.
- Experience integrating algorithms into larger software systems and debugging behavior using real-world data.
- Ability to reason about system behavior, performance, and reliability rather than treating algorithms as isolated components.
- Experience developing and validating software that ultimately runs on real hardware.