Autonomy Engineer, Navigation (R4171)
Shield AI
San Diego, CA, USA
USD 270k-400k / year + Equity
Posted on Nov 25, 2025
Founded in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed deep-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include the V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, Hivemind Enterprise, and the Hivemind Vision product lines. With nine offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.
Job Description:
Shield AI’s Hivemind autonomy team is building next-generation autonomy and navigation solutions for resilient, mission-critical systems. As an Autonomy Engineer, you will contribute directly to the design, development, integration, test, and deployment of the Hivemind navigation stack. We seek engineers with experience delivering robust navigation and state estimation solutions for defense aviation systems, ISR platforms, or other DoD-relevant applications, with strong expertise in C++ software development for embedded Linux systems. This role is open to engineers ranging from senior technical contributors to subject matter experts, depending on experience level and technical leadership capacity.
What you'll do:
- Research and develop advanced state estimation and navigation algorithms to ensure assured Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) in contested environments.
- Design, write, and deploy production-quality C++ software for aviation platforms requiring real-time, deterministic performance.
- Build and maintain comprehensive unit, integration, and system-level tests to validate navigation software performance under operational constraints.
- Develop modeling, calibration, and simulation tools for inertial and aided navigation technologies used in airborne platforms.
- Participate in agile-based product planning, feature definition, capacity estimation, and cross-team collaboration.
- Contribute to ongoing system performance evaluation, regression analysis, and V&V (Verification and Validation) efforts.
Required qualifications:
- Strong proficiency in modern C++ (C++11 or newer) and professional experience developing software for embedded Linux systems.
- Experience designing and deploying state estimation algorithms (e.g., error state EKF, UKF) in real-world defense or aerospace applications.
- Familiarity with developing for constrained environments requiring deterministic timing and high reliability.
- Deep understanding of inertial navigation systems (INS), GNSS integration, and navigation error modeling.
- Expertise calibrating and integrating IMUs, GPS receivers, magnetometers, and barometric sensors with flight software.
- Familiarity with MATLAB or Python for prototyping is acceptable; however, primary development experience must be in C++.
Preferred qualifications:
- Experience developing and deploying assured PNT systems for DoD customers.
- Expertise building digital models and simulations of navigation sensors and systems to inform hardware trade studies and mission analysis.
- Familiarity with alternative navigation techniques, such as celestial navigation, terrain-aided navigation, or vision-based navigation (VBN).
- Experience validating and verifying navigation systems in operational test environments.
- Principal-level applicants are expected to demonstrate thought leadership in navigation systems and may serve as technical mentors, roadmap authors, design reviewers, or proposal authors.
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Full-time regular employee offer package:
Pay within range listed + Bonus + Benefits + Equity
Temporary employee offer package:
Pay within range listed above + temporary benefits package (applicable after 60 days of employment)
Salary compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skill set, level of experience, licenses and certifications, and specific work location. All offers are contingent on a cleared background and possible reference check. Military fellows and part-time employees are not eligible for benefits. Please speak to your talent acquisition representative for more information.
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Shield AI is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know.
270000 - 400000 USD a year