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 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 is seeking a Senior Software Engineer (Integration) to serve as the software SME for the V-BAT Fleet Support team. In this role, you will own customer-facing engineering support for software issues affecting aircraft operations, onboard software, mission software, ground control interactions, logging, configuration, and subsystem integration across the fielded fleet.
You will serve as the bridge between Fleet Support and the software, autonomy, avionics, and systems engineering teams, helping transform field-reported issues into reproducible technical findings, corrective actions, and long-term product improvements.
### What you'll do:
Serve as the software SME for Fleet Support and lead escalated investigations involving fielded aircraft and mission software.
Triage and root-cause software issues affecting aircraft behavior, mission execution, subsystem integration, logging, configuration, and deployed operations.
Reproduce customer-reported issues in lab, simulation, and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) environments.
Analyze logs, telemetry, and system state to distinguish software defects from hardware, network, installation, or operator-workflow issues.
Debug integration points across onboard compute, ground control applications, payload interfaces, and external software dependencies.
Troubleshoot application programming interface (API) issues, configuration issues, and software-to-hardware interactions in operational environments.
Build and maintain lightweight tools, scripts, and automated checks that improve triage quality, reproducibility, and field support efficiency.
Support release readiness, validation, software deployment troubleshooting, and recovery planning for customer-facing operations.
Turn recurring fleet issues into actionable bug reports, engineering requirements, and product-improvement recommendations.
### Required qualifications:
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or a related discipline.
5+ years of experience in software engineering for robotics, autonomy, aerospace, unmanned aircraft systems, embedded systems, or other mission-critical platforms.
Strong programming skills in C++ and Python.
Strong Linux troubleshooting and systems-debug experience.
Experience debugging software that interfaces with hardware, sensors, networks, or distributed systems.
Ability to turn vague field symptoms into structured, reproducible technical findings.
Strong communication skills in cross-functional and customer-facing environments.
### Preferred qualifications:
Experience with autonomy software, flight software, embedded avionics software, or ground control software.
Experience with simulation, HIL, or automated test tooling.
Experience supporting deployed software, integration test, or operational validation efforts.
Experience supporting customer-site deployments or operational readiness events.
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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.
