Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit
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Job Description:
The Senior Staff Software Engineer, Autonomy will function as a hands on technical lead / subject matter expert and collaborate with Shield AI teammates / customers to build edge-AI and autonomy software for platforms across sea, air, and space. This role involves working closely with customers to understand their requirements, writing code, developing new capabilities and ensuring successful software/hardware integration, and mentoring teammates.
What you'll do:
Examples of Projects You will Work On:
Autonomous teaming drones.
Teaming between helicopters and drones.
Autonomy on Robodogs.
AI Pilots for Fighter Jets
and more!
Learn Hivemind: Become an expert user of the Hivemind Enterprise Autonomy Software Development Kit.
Tactical Autonomy Design – Design tactical autonomy algorithms to enable unmanned aircraft to perform complex missions across air, land, and sea domains with minimal human supervision.
High-Performance Software Development – Develop high-performance software modules that incorporate planning, decision-making, and behavior execution strategies for dynamic and adversarial environments.
Behavior Architecture Implementation – Implement and test behavior architectures that enable multi-agent coordination, target engagement, reconnaissance, and survivability in contested scenarios.
Hybrid Autonomy Integration – Work at the intersection of classical autonomy and machine learning, blending rule-based systems with learning-based methods such as reinforcement learning to achieve robust, adaptive behavior.
Hardware Software Integration:
Cross-Functional Collaboration – Collaborate with cross-functional teams including perception, planning, simulation, hardware, and flight test to ensure seamless integration of autonomy solutions on real-world platforms.
Deployment & Field Testing – Deploy autonomy capabilities to real platforms and participate in field tests and flight demos, validating performance in operationally relevant conditions.
Mission Data Analysis – Analyze mission logs and performance data to diagnose failures, optimize behavior models, and inform iterative development.
R&D and Roadmapping – Contribute to the autonomy roadmap by researching and prototyping new algorithms, identifying tactical capability gaps, and proposing novel solutions that advance Shield AI’s mission.
Program Support & Adaptation – Support defense-focused programs and customer needs by adapting autonomy solutions to evolving mission sets, compliance requirements, and operational feedback.
Handover / Training: Provide software handover and training to customers for their autonomy development efforts.
Documentation: Develop and maintain technical documentation for customer as well as internal use.
Travel Requirement – Members of this team typically travel around 10-15% of the year (to different office locations, customer sites, and flight integration events).Travel to and stay at customer sites as required for deployment / training / flight testing etc. (~30% travel).
Required qualifications:
Bachelor’s and Masters degree in Aerospace, AI, Computer Science, Robotics or a related engineering field.
12+ years of experience of industry experience
Ability to travel and stay deployed at customer sites across India/Asia.
3+ years of experience hands on writing software for autonomy/robotics applications.
2+ years of experience working in a startup environment.
Strong technical background in software engineering.
Strong proficiency in writing modern C++ code.
Intermediate proficiency in writing Python code.
Excellent problem-solving and analytical skills.
Strong communication and interpersonal skills.
Ability converse fluently in Hindi and English.
Preferred qualifications:
Experience in the defense aviation or robotics industry.
Ability to travel to USA for up to 3 months at a time for training.
