This position on the Autonomy team in the UK will lead the delivery of autonomous behaviors into our products, acting as technical leads, senior individual contributors, and/or as team leads that are also hands-on contributors. We expect candidates to demonstrate unparalleled end-to-end outcome ownership, driving the architecting, design, delivery, support, and evolution of safe and effective mission autonomy software throughout the entire product lifecycle.
What you'll do:
- Develop tactical autonomy software to enable unmanned platforms to perform complex missions across air, land, sea, and space domains with minimal human supervision
- Implement and test behaviors that enable multi-agent coordination, target engagement, reconnaissance, and survivability in contested scenarios
- Work throughout the entire of the software development lifecycle, from requirements capture through design, implementation, verification, and validation, utilizing tools and workflows consistent with collaborative high-quality software development
- Champion a product-line mindset in technology road-mapping and to enable reuse of behaviors across multiple projects and portfolios
- Utilize your software and systems expertise to architect behaviors as scalable software subsystems, that may interact directly or indirectly with a breadth of system components (e.g., sensor processing, state estimation, peer-to-peer communications, contingency management, actuation, and payload interfacing)
- Leverage internal product and program-specific engineering teams to rapidly deliver state-of-the-art capabilities to vehicle platforms (whether internally and externally owned), with a clear path towards architecture and capability evolution over time
- Collaborate with external teams, aligning on interfacing requirements between diverse systems, often working closely with vehicle integration teams and associated operational subject matter experts (e.g., fighter pilots, UAV operators, etc.)
- Act as a subject matter expert for software engineering, representing software equities in a multi-stakeholder environment including engineering, business and sales leadership.
- Travel to co-locate with end-users and/or other teams up to 20% of the time
Required qualifications:
- BS/MS/PhD in Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, or a related field
- Proficient in production-level C++ software development
- 7+ years' experience in one or more of the following: software sub-system scheduling and integration, behavior planning, task and resource allocation, motion planning, optimization, or flight controls
- Experience with collaborative software development tools for version control, issue tracking, code reviews, and release management
- Proven ability to lead multi-disciplinary teams, set technical direction, and manage full project lifecycles from concept to deployment
- Capacity to learn and grow individually, while mentoring junior team members effectively, building team cohesion and capacity
- Desire to work in a highly collaborative, fast paced, enthusiastic, and mission-centric environment
- Capacity to act as the technical owner for an entire software system, including stakeholder engagement, requirements definition, roadmap management, team co-ordination, design, implementation, sustainment, and evolution
Preferred qualifications:
- Experience across a breadth of technology readiness levels (TRLs) and demonstration of bridging concepts from research-grade to operationally ready
- Experience with mission systems integration, and ideally, hands-on experience supporting integration events and/or flight demonstrations
- Experience across a multitude of application areas, including but not limited to:
- Collaborative mission planning, behavior planning, synchronized teaming
- Automated red force vs blue force tactics
- Motion planning across a variety of vehicle classes, kinematic constraints, and team compositions
- Weapons target assignment, Sensor target pairing, sensor-centric control laws
- Collision avoidance, geofencing, and safety-monitoring
- Experience in more than one operational effect (e.g., strike, air combat, surveillance, reconnaissance, etc.) and more than one associated domain (e.g., air, space, maritime, ground, etc.)
- Experience with FOSS software that is commonly used in robotic systems (e.g., ROS, OMPL, optimization solvers, etc.)
- Experience with simulation tools and environments (e.g., AFSIM, NGTS) for testing and validation
- Familiarity with practical aspects of navigation and communications systems
- Experience across the product delivery lifecycle, from emerging opportunity through system acceptance, deployment, and sustainment
- Familiarity with systems engineering methodologies
- Familiarity with high-assurance software development processes (e.g., DO-178C or equivalent MIL-STD's)
Why join Shield AI:
- Help build the defining defence technology company of this century.
- Work at the forefront of AI, autonomy, and next-generation defence systems.
- Operate in a highly entrepreneurial and mission-driven environment.
- Make a direct impact on international growth and strategic defence partnerships.
- Collaborate with exceptional teams solving some of the world’s most complex operational challenges.
Skills Required
- BS/MS/PhD in Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, or related field
- Proficient in production-level C++ software development
- 7+ years experience in one or more: software sub-system scheduling and integration, behavior planning, task/resource allocation, motion planning, optimization, or flight controls
- Experience with collaborative software development tools for version control, issue tracking, code reviews, and release management
- Proven ability to lead multi-disciplinary teams, set technical direction, and manage full project lifecycles from concept to deployment
- Demonstrated capacity to mentor junior team members and build team cohesion and capacity
- Capacity to act as technical owner for an entire software system including stakeholder engagement, requirements definition, roadmap management, design, implementation, sustainment, and evolution
- Eligible to obtain and maintain an active U.S. Secret security clearance
- Experience across technology readiness levels and bridging research to operationally ready systems
- Experience with mission systems integration and hands-on support for integration events or flight demonstrations
- Experience with collaborative mission planning, behavior planning, synchronized teaming, and automated red force vs blue force tactics
- Experience with motion planning across various vehicle classes, kinematic constraints, and team compositions
- Experience with weapons target assignment, sensor target pairing, and sensor-centric control laws
- Experience with collision avoidance, geofencing, and safety-monitoring
- Experience with FOSS used in robotic systems (e.g., ROS, OMPL, optimization solvers)
- Experience with simulation tools/environments (e.g., AFSIM, NGTS) for testing and validation
- Familiarity with navigation and communications systems practical aspects
- Familiarity with systems engineering methodologies
- Familiarity with high-assurance software development processes (e.g., DO-178C or equivalent MIL-STD)
What the Team is Saying
Shield AI Compensation & Benefits Highlights
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Healthcare Strength — Healthcare coverage includes medical, dental, vision, and mental-health support, with company materials describing excellent coverage. Feedback suggests these offerings are comprehensive and consistently highlighted across official and third-party benefit lists.
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Equity Value & Accessibility — Equity is granted to all full-time hires, with RSU structures and tools like Carta Tax intended to improve understanding and tax timing. Feedback suggests this broad-based ownership approach is a notable component of total rewards.
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Parental & Family Support — Benefits include paid parental leave, fertility support, childcare benefits, family medical leave, and onsite resources such as a Mother's Room. Feedback suggests the family-oriented offerings are more expansive than basic coverage.
Shield AI Insights
What We Do
At Shield AI, you won't wait years to see your work reach the field. You'll build hardware and software that operates in the real world right now, in the hands of the people who depend on it. Hivemind, our AI pilot, has been flying since 2018. It has flown more than 30 platforms, including an F-16, and it now sits under a U.S. Air Force production contract for Collaborative Combat Aircraft. When you write code or shape a system here, you contribute to technology with a proven flight record and a clear production future. V-BAT flies intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions with an operational record that stretches from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific. It delivers eyes where they matter most, in the most demanding conditions on earth. The teams behind it watch their work get tested where the stakes are real. X-BAT takes its first flight this year. It's an AI-piloted fighter that needs no runway, built to operate where traditional aircraft can't. Join now and you help shape a program at its earliest, most formative stage. That's the kind of ground-floor work that defines a career. Do the most impactful work of your life, on problems that matter. Autonomy at this level asks a lot of you. You'll take on problems in perception, planning, and control that few teams anywhere are equipped to solve. You'll work across disciplines, from aerospace and robotics to machine learning and systems engineering, alongside people who hold themselves to an exacting standard and expect the same from you. Our mission is clear: protect service members and civilians with intelligent systems. That purpose runs through every decision, every design review, and every deployment. It's why the work here carries a weight you can feel. Ready to join our mission? Explore our open roles and find where you fit.
Why Work With Us
Founded in 2015 by a former Navy SEAL, Shield AI builds AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft. Veterans aren't an afterthought here, they're at every level. It's why the work carries weight: AI pilots and uncrewed aircraft flying real missions, from Ukraine to the Indo-Pacific, protecting service members and civilians.
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Hybrid Workspace
Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.
