Senior Robotics Systems Software Engineer

Cyngn’s Autonomy team is building and deploying software for autonomous industrial vehicles, and this role focuses on end-to-end engineering across the autonomy stack. You will help design, integrate, validate, and debug production-quality capabilities, from behavior and planning to controls, simulation, and field troubleshooting, working closely with engineers across perception, localization, vehicle infrastructure, hardware, QA, and operations.

This on-site position is based in Mountain View, CA, with a salary range of USD 180,000 - 200,000 per year. The Senior level requires 3+ years of hands-on robotics or autonomous systems software development experience.

What You’ll Do

• Design, develop, test, and deploy software for autonomous industrial vehicles across behavior and decision-making, motion planning, controls, and related vehicle systems.
• Write and maintain production-quality C++ and Python software for Cyngn’s autonomous vehicle platforms.
• Develop and integrate algorithms for navigation, trajectory generation, vehicle control, obstacle handling, and autonomous behaviors.
• Integrate autonomy software with sensors, drive-by-wire systems, vehicle hardware, and other onboard software components.
• Bring up, validate, and debug software on real vehicles by tracing issues across autonomy modules, middleware, hardware interfaces, and vehicle behavior.
• Create simulation scenarios and testing infrastructure, including metrics and regression tests to validate autonomy behavior before deployment.
• Investigate field issues and edge cases by reproducing failures, identifying root causes, and implementing robust production solutions.
• Support deployment and validation at customer facilities by translating real-world observations into improvements across the autonomy stack.
• Collaborate closely with engineers in Planning, Controls, Perception, Localization, Vehicle Infrastructure, Hardware, QA, and Operations.
• Contribute to architecture discussions, code reviews, technical design work, and continuous improvement for the autonomy software.

Required Qualifications

• BS, MS, or PhD in Robotics, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 3+ years of hands-on experience developing software for robotics, autonomous vehicles, or other autonomous systems.
• Strong proficiency in modern C++ and working proficiency in Python.
• Hands-on experience developing, testing, and deploying software on real robotic systems.
• Experience with ROS/ROS2 or comparable robotics middleware.
• Working knowledge of core robotics concepts including coordinate frames, kinematics, state estimation, motion planning, feedback control, and sensor integration.
• Strong systems-level understanding of how autonomy components interact with each other and with vehicle hardware.
• Experience debugging complex robotic systems where failures may span multiple software modules or hardware interfaces.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals, including algorithms, data structures, software architecture, testing, and code review.
• Strong communication and problem-solving skills, with the ability to work effectively across multiple engineering disciplines.

Technologies

• C++, Python, ROS, ROS2, Linux, Git, Docker, CMake

Benefits

• Health benefits (Medical, Dental, Vision) through Aetna, Kaiser Permanente, and Guardian, with multiple plan tiers
• Ancillary benefits including accident, critical illness, and hospital indemnity plans (Voya)
• Company-paid basic life insurance, plus voluntary supplemental life for you and your dependents
• Short-term and long-term disability insurance, fully paid by Cyngn
• HSA and FSA (Health & Dependent Daycare)
• Employee Assistance Program
• 1:1 Health Concierge
• Company 401(k)
• Commuter Benefits
• Flexible PTO policy
• Paid Parental Leave
• Daily lunches for in-office employees and a fully-stocked kitchen with snacks and beverages

Bonus Qualifications

• Technical depth in at least one area of robotics or autonomous systems, such as Behavior and decision-making; Motion planning; Vehicle or motion control
• Experience developing autonomous vehicles, mobile robots, industrial robots, or similar systems
• Experience with behavior trees, state machines, or other architectures for autonomous decision-making
• Experience with search-based or sampling-based motion planning techniques such as A*, Hybrid A*, RRT, or related algorithms
• Experience with feedback control, vehicle dynamics, trajectory tracking, MPC, or optimization-based control
• Experience with simulation environments and automated autonomy testing
• Experience integrating sensors, actuators, drive-by-wire systems, or embedded/real-time components
• Experience developing tooling, metrics, and CI/CD infrastructure for robotic systems
• Familiarity with Linux, Git, Docker, CMake, and modern software development workflows
• Experience taking robotics functionality from prototype through validation and production deployment

First 90 Days

• Build a working understanding of Cyngn’s autonomy architecture, simulation environment, vehicle platforms, development workflow, and deployment process.
• Partner with engineers across autonomy, infrastructure, hardware, QA, and operations to trace representative vehicle behaviors, build working relationships, and identify high-value reliability, integration, and test-coverage risks.
• Deliver one scoped production improvement, such as fixing a well-understood autonomy defect, adding a regression scenario, or improving diagnostic tooling, and validate it in simulation and, where appropriate, on a vehicle.
• Propose a prioritized plan for addressing one or two larger cross-stack risks, including candidate success metrics, data sources, and how each metric will be measured.

By 6 Months

• Complete a production-quality autonomy improvement spanning two or more subsystem boundaries and accepted into a release candidate and/or at production customer sites.
• Establish baseline metrics and demonstrate early improvement, such as improved scenario pass rate, fewer interventions, reduced tracking error, or faster failure resolution.
• Add reusable simulation scenarios, regression tests, diagnostics, or validation tools incorporated into team release-candidate testing.
• Publish a technical design or process improvement reviewed and adopted by affected teams.

By 12 Months

• Demonstrate sustained, measurable production improvement against the six-month baseline through broader deployment and fleet monitoring.
• Own a significant autonomy capability from design through implementation, vehicle validation, deployment, and production monitoring.
• Improve team effectiveness through documentation, code and design reviews, and reusable cross-stack debugging practices.
• Demonstrate technical ownership through observable signals, such as serving as a reviewer for one or two repositories, leading triage for a class of field issues, or maintaining adopted runbooks and tools used by other engineers.

Interview Process

• A real person will review your application.
• A one-sided video interview to share background and cover basic questions.
• A Recruiter touch point to review the process in more detail and answer questions.
• A 45-minute interview with the hiring manager.
• A full-loop process with 3-4 additional conversations covering technical and soft skills and culture fit.
• A final onsite interview with the team.