What you'll do:
- Build and maintain the V-BAT system reliability model, predicting system-level failure rate using failure-rate data from the field and industry sources.
- Create and maintain the V-BAT system fault tree, identifying single points of failure and quantifying their contribution to overall system reliability.
- Inform design decisions that eliminate single points of failure and improve the reliability of the system, providing Design-for-Reliability (DfR) guidance in design reviews.
- Partner with Design, Fleet Support, Quality, and Manufacturing Engineers on root cause investigations for field failures, and drive corrective and preventive actions to closure.
- Drive reliability test campaigns in production and sustainment to verify the system is meeting its reliability requirements and predictions, feeding results back into the model.
- Drive production reliability screening campaigns to reduce infant-mortality failures, such as HASS (Highly Accelerated Stress Screening) and ESS (Environmental Stress Screening).
- Establish and track reliability metrics — MTBF, failure-rate trends, and reliability growth — and communicate reliability status and risk posture to program leadership.
Required qualifications:
- B.S. in Engineering, Mathematics, or Statistics discipline.
- 5+ years of experience in reliability or surety engineering in a high-consequence industry (defense, aerospace, automotive, or medical device).
- Expertise in Fault Tree Analysis (FTA), Failure Modes, Effects, and Criticality Analysis (FMECA), and Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) calculations.
- Demonstrated ability to build reliability models from field and test data and translate them into actionable design and production decisions.
Preferred qualifications:
- Experience with Reliability, Availability, and Maintainability (RAM) modeling and Weibull analysis.
- Experience with reliability analysis software such as Relyence (or equivalent tools such as ReliaSoft/Weibull++, Windchill Risk & Reliability).
- Familiarity with government standards for developing reliability and maintainability models, such as MIL-HDBK-217, 217Plus, and MIL-STD-756.
- Experience implementing FRACAS (Failure Reporting, Analysis, and Corrective Action System) and supporting Failure Review Boards.
- CRE (ASQ Certified Reliability Engineer) certification.
- Experience with unmanned aircraft, aerospace, or other mission-critical hardware systems.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Mathematics, or Statistics
- At least 5 years of experience in reliability or surety engineering within defense, aerospace, automotive, medical device, or another high-consequence industry
- Expertise in Fault Tree Analysis, Failure Modes Effects and Criticality Analysis, and MTBF calculations
- Ability to build reliability models from field and test data and translate findings into design and production decisions
- Experience with Reliability, Availability, and Maintainability modeling and Weibull analysis
- Experience with reliability analysis software such as Relyence, ReliaSoft, Weibull++, or Windchill Risk & Reliability
- Familiarity with MIL-HDBK-217, 217Plus, and MIL-STD-756
- Experience implementing FRACAS and supporting Failure Review Boards
- ASQ Certified Reliability Engineer certification
- Experience with unmanned aircraft, aerospace, or mission-critical hardware systems
What the Team is Saying
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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Shield AI Offices
Hybrid Workspace
Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.
